Bradford 2025 is already making strides and it will change the lives of young people forever - Shanaz Gulzar

That roar was the perfect expression of what the judges felt when they had visited the city. Bradford wanted this, and needed this, more than anywhere else. In the year since our win, we’ve had time to take stock and to put in place the foundations on which to build our transformational City of Culture programme.

Now, having been appointed as creative director alongside our executive director, Dan Bates, we’re already feeling the impact of the win. The eyes of the world are on Bradford district and people are finally seeing what we’ve known for a long time. This place is special. Arts Council England (ACE) recently announced that Bradford is set to receive over £3.3m per year in National Portfolio Organisation (NPO) funding – an 89 per cent increase on 2021/22 levels. Bradford 2025 is funding a talent development programme alongside Bradford Producing Hub, to upskill and raise the bar for work being produced by home grown artists and producers, and we’ve also commissioned 35 local artists and organisations to create or develop new ideas that we hope will be part of our cultural programme in 2025. Working alongside Bradford Council, we’ve made available £110,000 for new commissions to make ‘Bradford is LIT’ – the district’s biannual light festival - bigger and better this year than ever before; a major runway event on our road to 2025.

And it’s not just artists and organisations that are benefitting. Major capital development projects are being accelerated because of our UK City of Culture status. Kala Sangam and the National Science & Media Museum – two major cultural venues in the city – will soon close to undergo major redevelopment projects, ready to reopen and welcome visitors in 2025. The long-awaited Bradford Live – the former Odeon cinema being transformed into a new 4,00O capacity music venue – is also set to play a major role in our UK City of Culture celebrations.

This investment goes beyond the cultural sector – this summer, Bradford Council will start major infrastructure works to pedestrianise huge swathes of the city centre, transforming the way people move around the city centre to make it healthier, safer and greener. The £23m Darley Street Market scheme, set to open next year, will bring an incredible new retail and leisure offer to the city.

The legacy of the city of culture is something that we talk about a lot – and we’re putting it at the heart of our programme right from the start with a new £3m cultural capital fund which will provide grants to enable the growth of cultural infrastructure across the district. Funded by Bradford Council and delivered by Bradford 2025, this investment will enable us to either upgrade existing or create new high-quality venues and locations for arts and cultural activities.

It's imperative we increase the opportunities for people in the district to engage with more arts and cultural activities on their doorstep – and I’m excited that we’re inviting submissions for a RIBA (Royal Institute of British Architects) feasibility study and early concept design for ‘Beacon’, a flagship project for Bradford 2025. ‘Beacon’ will be a temporary touring performance venue which will host a programme of live events across the district during 2025, visiting greenfield or public park sites across the district.

Community groups can apply for a new fund set up in a special partnership with Bradford 2025 and Give Bradford, making grants available to help communities across the district celebrate Bradford City of Culture, create work and events to support the programme across the year.

The district’s young people, who were instrumental in helping us win the title, continue to play a major role in shaping our programme. We are creating opportunities for our young people to be at the heart of developing the programme, to work with artists locally and nationally to share their ideas and vision for 2025.

In the hundreds of conversations I’ve had over the last year, one thing is unanimously agreed - this is our chance to change the futures of our young people forever.

Shanaz Gulzar is creative director of Bradford 2025.​​​​​​​