UK City of Culture 2025: Bradford told 'hard work properly starts now' after historic win

The Bradford 2025 team celebrated with hundreds of people in the city centre on Tuesday, after Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries announced the district had beaten Southampton, County Durham and Wrexham to claim a historic victory.

They are now working to deliver more than 1,000 performances and events that celebrate Bradford’s “unique heritage and character” and feature work from 365 artists during the year of culture.

Shanaz Gulzar, chair of Bradford 2025, said: “Now we take everything we have planned and everything that we have imagined, and make it into reality. So the hard work properly starts now.

“The programme is made up of all the ideas from the conversations and meetings that we’ve already had with people.

“We’re going to carry on looking out how we can deliver that and we’ve got music, we’ve got film and theatre and we’ve got work happening in streets and work happening in parks.

“We’re working with the contacts we have regionally to see what we can create that is truly innovative, truly Bradford and truly different.”

Ms Gulzar said there will be four themes for the year of culture and Bradford 2025 will work with diverse communities across the district and encourage them to create their own artwork and submit ideas and pitches.

‘Coming of Age’ will celebrate Bradford’s young people and their artistic ideas throughout 2025, when 30,000 teenagers in the district are due to turn 18, and ‘Everything is Connected’ will look at science, technology and innovation.

‘City of the World’, will explore Bradford’s industrial history and the impact it has had on various countries across the globe, and ‘Welcome Home Sexy’, which is named after a well-known piece of graffiti outside Bradford Interchange, will take a look at the district’s unique character and socially progressive attitude.

But Bid Director Richard Shaw said it is “not just all about 2025” and the team want to work with a range of artists and communities to leave a lasting legacy.

“It is about the legacy it leaves behind and the years beyond 2025,” he said. “There’s going to be a vast increase in the amount of active participation and presentations you see here in Bradford, but it’s going to go beyond the year itself.”

Bradford 2025 has also said the coveted title could bring an extra £700m of investment to the district, create around 3,000 jobs and attract 1.1m visitors.

It was one of 20 locations that submitted a bid to become the next UK City of Culture and it had been competing against County Durham, Wrexham and Southampton since the final shortlist was announced in March.

The 10-person panel of judges for the competition, which was led by screenwriter Sir Phil Redmond, visited the four locations which made it into the final earlier this month and then conducted interviews with bid teams in London, during the final stage of the competition.

After Bradford was crowned the winner on Tuesday night, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport praised the “young and vibrant city” and said its impressive bid “drew upon its wide-range of local cultural assets”, including the Brontë Parsonage and Saltaire UNESCO World Heritage Site.