20 Nov 2013

Hull named UK city of culture, 2017

It was home to Philip Larkin and has the UK’s only known “bridge to nowhere” – now Hull is chosen as UK city of culture for 2017 after a bid themed around “a city coming out of the shadows”.

Video above supported Hull’s winning City of Culture bid

There were cheers and celebrations in Hull as the city was announced the winner of the 2017 bid for UK city of culture, beating Leicester, Dundee and Swansea Bay.

Hull will follow in the footsteps of Londonderry, which has seen a range of cultural events around the city this year – and around £120m of capital investment – since it won the inaugural UK City of Culture title in 2009.

Being awarded the title is the latest boost to Yorkshire, which Lonely Planet recently named third best region to visit in the world.

Hull is based on the coast of east Yorkshire, and already boasts a range of cultural ambassadors. Philip Larkin, who started work as a librarian at the city’s university in 1955 and lived in the area until his death in 1985, who called Hull “a city that is in the world, yet sufficiently on the edge of it, to have a different resonance”.

When it comes to music, Hull boasts David Bowie guitarist Mick Ronson and the Housemartins among its alumni. The duo Everything but the Girl also got together while studying in the city. The Hall Truck Theatre, which counts Alan Plater, John Godber and Oscar-winning film director Anthony Minghella among its alumni, was also started in Hull.

The city is also home to two rugby clubs and two bridges – the Humber Bridge, and the Scale Lane bridge. The latter was supposed to join the city centre with development on the other side of the river that was never built. It has inevitably been dubbed the “bridge to nowhere”.

Derry ‘unrecognisable’

So how much impact will the new title have? The award is still in its early stages, with Derry being the only recipient so far. But in an open letter to Hull, Martin Bradley from Culture Company, which delivered Derry’s programme of events, wrote that the city had transformed Derry.

“Our sense of place, confidence and civic pride is unrecognisable from the place we were three years ago,” he wrote in the Guardian.

The idea for the UK City of Culture came from the European award of the same name, which worked wonders for Liverpool’s fortunes when it was city of culture in 2008. The title is intended to drive a city’s economy and spread the UK’s cultural events further afield from the main cities.

In 2013, Derry has hosted the UK-wide Turner prize, the London Symphony Orchestra and the Lumiere – and seen visitor numbers over the year. But there have also been programmes of community engagement, the development of better broadband and a range of local cultural events promoting artists and the cultural scene closer to home.

Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport Maria Miller said: “It can produce a wonderful mix of inward investment, and civic pride, and I hope Hull’s plans will make the most of all that being UK city of culture can bring.”

Hull put forward the most compelling case based on its theme as ‘a city coming out of the shadows’. Phil Redmond

TV producer Phil Redmond, who chaired the advisory panel that helped choose the winner, said all four shortlisted cities showed a “real understanding” of what the award was about. “But ultimately it was the unanimous verdict of the panel that Hull put forward the most compelling case based on its theme as ‘a city coming out of the shadows’,” he added. “This is at the heart of their project and reminds both its people and the wider world of both its cultural past and future potential.

“We were particularly impressed with Hull’s evidence of community and creative engagement, their links to the private sector and their focus on legacy, including a commitment to enhance funding beyond 2017 and I’d like to congratulate all involved.”

However it may take some time for Hull to shift its reputation, of being “grim up north”, said some of our viewers…