Tag: sunderland

Creative Repurposing: Heritage Assets in Urban Renewal

Between May and July 2022, I’ve been working as a researcher for the Centre for the History of People, Place and Community. Our project examined the idea of ‘creative repurposing’ and my focus was the refurbishment of a short row of buildings at 170–175 High Street West, Sunderland.

Above: 170–175 High Street West, Sunderland, 2017. Photo © Alun Bull, Historic England Archive.

170–175 High Street West, Sunderland in 2022. An oblique view of three shopfronts from across the street. From left to right, a turquoise shopfrint with an A-frame sign outside; a dark green shopfrint with a curved bay window above, and a dark grey shopfront with the word POP in large white letters at upper left. Part of a fourth building neoclassical frontage with decorated columns is at the far right.
170–175 High Street West, Sunderland, 2022. Photo: Mark Liebenrood.

I worked alongside two other researchers, Rachel Delman and Jon Winder, who were looking at similar projects in Coventry and Barking & Dagenham.

You can watch one product of our research: an online event about creative repurposing in June.