Exclusive: Leadmill landlord to take over the building

Good afternoon readers — and welcome to our Monday briefing.

It’s a story we’ve been following for almost three years now — the fate of iconic Sheffield club The Leadmill. Now we know: The Leadmill will be being taken over by its landlord Dominic Madden after a judge ruled against current owner Phil Mills. All the latest is below.

As well as that we also have a big story about Sheffield’s latest attempt to market itself to the outside world, plus all your usual updates and recommendations.

In case you missed it

Last week, Holly Williams hit the town to ponder why our city seems unusually averse to dressing up for a night out. While most of our readers felt this was one of Sheffield’s many positives, it seemed no one would deny there is a distinct difference between us and other “northern glam” cities like Liverpool and Leeds. “Literally reading this in the town centre wearing waterproof overtrousers,” wrote Patrick D. Our paying subscribers got to join Dan as he spent a day with the detectorists, on the hunt for historic treasure, and read Victoria’s article on the progress (or lack of) in Prince William’s fight to end homelessness in our city.

As ever, if you want to get all our journalism, and support a small but dedicated team trying to make Sheffield better, then join us today.

The big picture: Wall art 🖼️

Sheffield is a great place for street art and Shepherd Street on the edge of the city centre is fast becoming a go to place for graffiti artists. Three murals have appeared there in recent weeks, including this one by Ethan Lemon. Thanks to the wonderful Street Art Sheffield website for this picture.

Exclusive: The Leadmill has lost to its landlord

The Tribune understands that The Leadmill has lost its legal battle with its landlord and will have to leave the iconic building. While the judge has yet to formally announce his decision, word is already spreading among the venue’s staff. The Leadmill’s owner Phil Mills has previously suggested that, if evicted, he would open a new venue with the same name in a different city. 

The battle over the building has been raging since March 2022, when its landlord Dominic Madden told The Leadmill that he would not be renewing its lease. Madden — whose company Electric Group runs three music venues in London, Bristol and Newcastle — bought the building in 2016 for £600,000, intending to turn it into his fourth. While Mills was also offered the chance to buy the building a decade ago, for an asking price of £500,000, he was allegedly unwilling to pay more than £150,000. 

For almost three years, The Leadmill has been fighting to stay put, a battle it insists is over the “soul of Sheffield”. Their campaign centred on the fact that a wealthy London entrepreneur was seizing a beloved institution out of local control. However, as we first reported two years ago, many people involved with the creation of The Leadmill in 1980 felt Mills was finally getting a taste of his own medicine. 

When the venue was first created, it was the profitable arm of a revolutionary non-profit arts centre, which even received a visit from Princess Diana. It was only in 1994 that Mills took full control, turning it from a charity into a for-profit business. As one person familiar with the original Leadmill said: “The current management of The Leadmill are trading on its history but they didn’t build that history, so it’s up for sale along with everything else.”

What happens now is up to the two parties. During the legal hearing in December, Mills warned that, if unsuccessful, he would rip out everything added to the building when it was converted from a disused factory in the late 1970s, leaving Dominic Madden with an empty shell. Even if he follows through on that threat, Madden insisted in court that he was confident he could get his venue — which he will not be able to call The Leadmill — up and running by September.

Reporting by Dylan Kearsley.

Help us out: Were you involved in the Gateway siege last week? Perhaps you live in the building, helped with the police/ambulance response or know some more details?

We’re doing a longer read into the events later this week. Get in touch at: editor@sheffieldtribune.co.uk

The big story: Sheffield is trying to sell itself. Is this the best way? 

Top line: Last year, Sheffield Council awarded a marketing firm £140,000 to rebrand the city. The result is “Sheffield Inspires”, a strategy they hope will make us "one of the UK's… most attractive cities for trade, tourism and talent". Will it work?

Selling Sheff: Some might ask what is the point of marketing Sheffield at all. Surely it’s all but impossible to take a city as large and complex as our own and distill it into a marketing slogan. However, in an era where regional cities increasingly have to stand on their own two feet, and are competing with each other as a result, it’s important we get our message right.

• According to a council report, in 2022, Sheffield was visited more than 15.8 million times — both for business and pleasure — which is thought to have generated £1.35 billion for the local economy.
• Sheffield currently scores 3.5 out of 5 on a scale that measures people’s opinions of cities from around the world. Increasing this by just 0.1 could result in an extra £70 million for the local economy (Bloom/CNP and STEAM research).

The fateful eight: After a year of work, the marketeers have come up with “Sheffield Inspires” eight key messages based on the city’s history, culture and environment that the council hopes will bring both people and investment to the city. They are:

1. Greener Cities — Greenspace is incorporated into Sheffield’s DNA
2. The Beautiful Game — Pioneered the rules of football 
3. A Global Health Tech Revolution — The first Centre for Child Health Technology
4. The Craft of Beer – Put UK craft brewing on the map
5. The Capital of Modern Manufacturing – The UK capital of cutting edge research
6. The Art of Climbing – The best place for the fastest growing sport in the world
7. The Evolution of Electronic Music – Pioneering electronic music since the 70s
8. A Sustainable Future for Aviation – At the forefront of the biggest shift in transport

Outdoor city no more? Contrary to a report on the BBC website, the council says Sheffield Inspires is not a rebrand but a “development of the current and existing city branding, which has many sub brands/branches and campaigns linked to it”. While this might seem like it is splitting hairs, it does mean that some of the other city branding will continue.

• Since 2016, Sheffield has been known as the Outdoor City. This was seen as a way of emphasising the city’s natural environment and proximity to the Peak District, as well as banishing the “Full Monty image of industrial decline”.
• When we asked the council whether the rebrand meant the hugely successful Outdoor City brand was dead, they told us it will continue to be used “as a sub brand of the Sheffield brand…for specific campaigns and activity”.

London calling: It caused some consternation when the news was announced last year that London-based firm Manasian&Co had won the contract to rebrand Sheffield. One local marketing professional said the decision to award the contract to a firm outside the city was “very disappointing” and showed a “lack of confidence in Sheffield”, although the council said the London-firm had won the contract fair and square. The eight key messages don’t read like they have been drafted by people who know nothing about the city, but some will still argue a Sheffield-based firm could easily have produced something as good, or better.

Our take: Like it or not, all cities brand themselves, and modern day Don Drapers benefit as a result. The question is whether the selling points that have been chosen are the right ones, and whether it will work. 

Unlike our pretty negative assessment of the city goals, there’s a lot to like here. It feels specific and pithy, and a lot of the things it’s alighted on — green space, beer, climbing — are genuine strengths that do attract people to our city. Plus it’s good to see the call to focus much more on our football history has been heeded (see our recent piece here). There’s also been a push to include economic goals, suggesting this isn’t just about persuading careworn Londoners to relocate here, but businesses too. 

Our concerns? The “Sheffield Inspires” tagline is unlikely to catch on — though perhaps that doesn’t matter too much. A bigger issue is whether the council and its partners have the resources to push eight different messages to eight different audiences at the same time. An all-in version of the delivery would include active promotion among the UK’s climbing, craft beer, electronic music (etc) communities. But doing this on a tight budget will be tricky. We wait to see the plan.

What do you think? Let us know in the comments.

Go deeper: read our long read on selling Sheffield from last year. 

The weekly Whitworth ✏️

Cartoonist James Whitworth with his take on Sheffield’s new marketing strategy.

Your Tribune briefing 🗞️

🇺🇸 Last week, US President Donald Trump announced he was raising the import tax on foreign steel to an eye-watering 25% — so should the steel city be worried? Sort of, according to The Times. Gareth Stace, the director-general of UK Steel, insists Trump is taking a “sledgehammer to free trade with huge ramifications for the steel sector in the UK,” an industry that, despite decades of steady decline, is still a significant local employer. However, UK steelmakers have increasingly concentrated on producing specialist, high-grade steel, which could insulate them from the shock. “Sheffield steel still really carries quite a weight globally,” said Emma Parkinson, chief executive of International Energy Products.

💣 The man accused of a “bomb hoax” that triggered a 36-hour police stand-off in the city centre last week has denied the charges against him. Yaqub Younis, a 47-year-old from Broad Street, pleaded not guilty to affray, communicating false information, causing a public nuisance and criminal damage. Last week, around 100 residents of The Gateway flats on Broad Street were evacuated to the Ponds Forge sports centre as a result of the incident. 

🔬 Researchers at Sheffield Hallam University are working on a way to detect cancer through a simple breath test, which could save lives by ensuring the disease is spotted earlier. The test would particularly help spot mesothelioma, a disease primarily affecting the lungs and almost always caused by asbestos exposure. However Cancer Research UK, which has put more than £70,000 into the project, said the findings could also potentially help detect other cancers linked to inflammation, including laryngeal and ovarian cancer.

Coming up

This week, we’ll be sending out two more newsletters to over 2,500 members. In the first, we spoke to the team behind a project trying to help Rotherham heal from the infamous grooming scandal. In the second, Dan takes you behind the scenes of a recent local drama.

To get all that in your inbox, just click below.

This week’s weather 🌥️

Our weather forecast comes from dedicated Sheffield weather service Steel City Skies, who say the week will start chilly and dry and gradually become milder and windier.

Monday 🌥 Early local frost, then dry with some hazy sun although mostly cloudy. Gentle winds and highs of around 5°C.

Tuesday 🌥 Early frost giving way to bright spells as well as cloudier intervals. Light winds and highs of 6°C. Cold again overnight.

Wednesday 🌥 A little milder and mostly dry with bright spells. Cloud perhaps increasing later, and turning milder overnight. Highs of 9°C.

Thursday 🌦 A mild but very mixed bag with some brightness but also the likelihood of outbreaks of rain. Gusty winds and highs of 13°C.

Friday 🌦 Similarly changeable, with a keen breeze from the south bringing rain-bearing weather fronts, along with brighter intervals. Highs of 13°C.

Weekend: Staying mild and breezy with bright or sunny spells and occasional showers, too.

To see the full forecast and keep up to date with any changes to the outlook, follow Steel City Skies on Facebook.

Home of the week 🏡

Never have to share a bathroom with anyone ever again in this five bedroom, four bathroom terrace on Cemetery Road in Sharrow. With almost 2,900 sq ft spread across four floors, the property also has solar panels, three reception rooms, and a private rear garden and double garage/workshop at the back. What more could you want? It is on the market for £425,000.

Tribune tips: If you want to tell us about a story or give us some information, please get in touch with us by emailing editor@sheffieldtribune.co.uk. We are happy to speak to people off the record, and we guarantee we will treat your information with confidence and sensitivity.

Things to do 📆

Music 🎸 A fantastic opportunity to see one of the UK’s most talked about new bands in the intimate surrounding of Crookes Social Club. When they first broke through, Welsh indie rockers The Bug Club were on Sheffield based Bingo Records, but last year signed to the US based Sub Pop label (of Nirvana fame). Listeners to BBC 6 Music will know them well where they are played regularly on Marc Riley’s show. Tickets are £17.60 and doors open at 7.30pm.

Art 🖼️ On now at Site Gallery is Subjects of State, Labours of Love by Rhea Storr, an intimate portrait of Caribbean associations including Sheffield’s own SADACCA (Sheffield African and Caribbean Community Association). Shot on 16mm film, the immersive multi-channel video installation captures the joys, celebrations, struggles, oppressions and complexities experienced by Caribbean communities. The free show runs until 25 May.

Talk 🌱 To the Mowbray in Neepsend on Tuesday comes Talking Plants, a social evening for people who love plants (think Gardeners’ Question Time with more wine). Join them for an evening full of plant chat, as they invite super knowledgeable plants people to spill the beans on their favourite plants to suit various garden conditions. The talk will be followed by an early spring plant ident. Tickers are priced £6 (student £4) and the talk begins at 7.30pm.