Culture Guides
Destination Guides
Once branded by George Orwell as “the ugliest town in the Old World”, Sheffield’s past and its cultural present are founded on one thing: the steel industry. During the 19th century, Sheffield witnessed explosive growth, the city we see today shaped by its industrial prosperity of old. So its leafy suburbs, for example, were purposely built up hill so that domestic residences would sit above the smog-blanketed centre of foundries and furnaces.
The cutlery works of Sheffield’s past have found new purpose in driving forward the city’s creative life; many now house galleries, independent shops and artist studios. Sheffield’s current status as the country’s greenest city is also, in some incongruous way, due to its industrial heritage: open spaces like the Botanical Gardens were designed to offer Victorian residents a much-needed breath of fresh air. While other cities bustle between high rises and shopping precincts, Sheffield is a place to pause and look around, whether inwards from its hillsides, over spires, chimneys and curling valleys, or outwards from the city centre, to the breeze and birdsong of the moorland that continues to inspire so many artists, designers and makers.
Construction House at S1 Artspace
Construction House is a six-month programme of commissions, exhibitions, events and activities by S1 Artspace studio holders, which will explore the role, possibilities and responsibilities of collective artistic activity today.
Who We Are: Photographs by Martin Jenkinson at Weston Park Museum
For over four decades Sheffield-based photojournalist Martin Jenkinson chronicled the drama and detail of our everyday lives. Discover his work as part of ‘Who We Are: Photographs by Martin Jenkinson’ at Weston Park Museum.
Re-collections at Site Gallery, Sheffield
Re-collections at Site Gallery brings together the work of three phenomenal artists from Site’s archive – Susan Hiller, Elizabeth Price and Georgina Starr – honouring a tradition of supporting and championing women for the past 40 years. C
Places to go / stay / shop / eat / drink
Sheffield Visitor Guides
Restaurants in Sheffield
From artisanal coffee in industrial chic settings to the kind of burritos that can resurrect…
Art Galleries in Sheffield
A contender for the UK’s largest practicing community of artists and designers outside London – there’s a pretty impressive number of top art galleries in Sheffield.
Cinemas in Sheffield
Cinemas in Sheffield cater for all tastes, with arthouse venues sitting happily alongside big multiplex screens – including one of only two IMAX with laser projection screens in the country.
Museums in Sheffield
Sheffield has more than its fair share of weird and wonderful museums housed within its seven hills. Check out our favourites.
Theatres in Sheffield
Sheffield is home to the world-famous Crucible, the W R G Sprague built Lyceum and Sheffield’s home for the avant-garde, the Theatre Delicatessen.
Literary places in Sheffield
Literary places are scattered about Sheffield, which has plenty of live literature events to pop along to and perform at, and more independent poetry presses than you can shake a stick at.
Sheffield District Guides
London Road & the Antiques Quarter, Sheffield
Centuries ago, London Road was a thoroughfare used by farmers taking their cattle to market,…
Kelham Island, Sheffield
The engraving “Made in Sheffield” continues to stand for quality on knives and forks around…
Hunter’s Bar, Sheffield
On 31 October 1884, the gatekeeper at Hunter’s Bar toll-house requested the city’s last ever…
Devonshire Quarter, Sheffield
Directly west of the city centre, the Devonshire Quarter comes alive both by day and…
City Centre, Sheffield
Welcoming visitors as soon as they step off the train to Sheffield is the Sheffield…
Broomhill and Crookes, Sheffield
To the west of the city, the suburbs of Broomhill and Crookes, though small, contain…
