“Creativity is in our DNA”: How Wakefield is emerging as Yorkshire’s next creative hub

It’s the brainchild of property development company City & Provincial Properties, following the success of sister site Tileyard London and its 200,000 sq ft campus in Kings Cross. It’s used by artists as a place to record such as Noel Gallagher and The Prodigy and home to the likes of SoundCloud, Believe, Ultra Publishing and Ableton.

The vision is to replicate the same success in Wakefield. With phase one of Tileyard North’s regeneration of the grade II historic mill buildings – known as Rutland Mills – now complete, it’s already a big transformation after standing derelict for decades.

On a tour around Tileyard North, the revamped mills boast idyllic views overlooking the waterfront or city skyline, equipped with music studios and office, meeting, coworking and event spaces.

Audoo, The Yorkshire Food Group and The Music Factory Entertainment Group are just a handful of the creative businesses already announcing moves to the new hub.

“You have to create the right environment for people to be successful, then that can create its own success stories in itself. It’s very clear to me that the North, not just Wakefield, has a massive opportunity with a great talent pool but it needs investment, it needs incubation, which is a lot of what we do in London,” says Nick Keynes, co-founder of Tileyard.

“The creative sector, businesses and individuals need an environment where they can incubate their ideas, their businesses, their own careers. That support, education and connection that we can provide I think is really important.”

Opening for business earlier this year, the second phase of the project is already underway to refurbish the remaining mill buildings thanks to a slice of £20m from the Levelling Up Fund that was allocated to Wakefield.

But why did Tileyard’s owners choose Wakefield for its Northern base? “We love a challenge, we thought it was a bit too easy in London,” he teases.

It was actually a serendipitous moment behind Tileyard North’s story after Paul Kempe, founder of City & Provincial Properties and owner of Tileyard, spotted the mills out of the corner of his eye when attending an event at The Hepworth next door. 

“We had a real appetite to do something in the North. Before we knew it, there was an opportunity to bring our brand to Wakefield,” he explains. After conversations with the council and doing a bit of research, Wakefield “ticked a lot of boxes” from its accessibility to the location itself. 

“Wakefield has a massive opportunity to really put itself on the map. There seems to have been a lot of investment in other Northern cities such as Leeds, Liverpool and Manchester and I think Wakefield is one of the next cities to hopefully really emerge.”

“Our transformation has been significant”

For a city on a mission to establish itself as a creative and cultural hub, there’s already creativity “oozing from every corner”, says Russell.

Two major gaming studios are headquartered in Wakefield with Rebellion North and Team17, as well as digital and creative companies such as 6B Digital and Stada Media dotted across the district.

“Our transformation has been significant over recent years and I think that’s super exciting.” 

2019 marked a milestone opportunity when the council secured a £4.4m government grant to turn Wakefield into an ‘internationally renowned location’ to promote its creative industry. It was a “massive vote of confidence” in Wakefield.

“The picture we painted to the funders was that although we had the right ingredients across the district, we were a bit uncoordinated,” she explains. “We have all these wonderful things happening but there wasn’t really a narrative about it. It was as if no one spoke to each other.”

To bring the freelance creatives, established creative companies and the likes of Tileyard North and live events and production campus Production Park together, the council helped to establish a network called Creative Wakefield to encourage deeper collaborations and networking.

“As a local authority, we knew this wasn’t about us. This was about the wider economy, public, private and voluntary sector because creatives are across all of them,” she says. 

Starting with just eight people in a room, the network has since expanded to 650 members. It all ties into what the council says is a commitment to invest further in the creative sector.

This includes offering creative courses, business support for those spin-outs emerging from Tileyard and Production Park to scale up, and skilled support to encourage those from deprived or underrepresented backgrounds to see the creative industry as a viable career choice as creatives, artists and musicians showcase their talents in schools.

Production Park

Investing in local projects has been crucial to positioning Wakefield as a creative city. A hidden gem based in South Kirby for around 25 years, Production Park is home to a community of live events businesses and rehearsal studios.

It has played an important part in establishing Wakefield’s creative reputation on an international stage, used by the likes of Arctic Monkeys, Lady Gaga and for the production of TV series and ads but it’s supporting the next generation of talent too.

On site is specialist education provider The Academy of Live Technology, formerly known as Backstage Academy, offering courses, bespoke training and support with industry networks and contacts.

Whether it’s working on the Rugby League World Cup, Qatar World Cup, Eurovision, Glastonbury or Cirque Du Soleil, Production Park offers “lots of opportunities” for young people to dip their toes into the creative industry.

“As people learn through Production Park’s academy, they’re spinning out as little companies,” adds Russell. “You have all these youngsters becoming entrepreneurs very early on. It’s super exciting!”

“We moved here when the business was just getting started, relocating from Leeds as we needed bigger premises to build staging pieces for Opera North which was starting to expand and spread its wings at the time,” explains Jim Farmery, director of external affairs at Production Park.

“We sit literally right in the middle of Sheffield and Leeds. It’s a lovely part of the world and really well connected, we have people who work here that went to the universities in Leeds or Sheffield, so we have access to talent, as well as the people at the Academy.”

Although transport “could always be better”, he sees the city’s potential for growth.

“House prices in Leeds are getting a little bit inflated now because it’s doing so well, so I know a lot of people are looking to areas in Wakefield to live. It’s great if we can tap into that.”

Government spotlight on Wakefield

After the UK government recently announced millions in new funding for the creative sector, Production Park was one of only four facilities selected across the UK to establish a new research hub called CoSTAR to ‘revolutionise film, TV and performing arts’.

“It’s brilliant for us. To be in the same company as places like Pinewood Studios, Royal Holloway, Abertay in Dundee, and then Ulster in Belfast, it really puts us on the map in terms of academic research, research activities and the facilities we’re going to have here.”

Similar to how The University of Sheffield Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC) has attracted Boeing, McLaren and Rolls-Royce, the new CoStar lab could offer Wakefield the same opportunities by attracting global names.

With similar ambitions to Production Park, Tileyard North hopes its investment in the region will not only pave the way for more jobs and attract new businesses, but facilitate the growth of creatives already based in Wakefield.

“It’s great when you can bring in a known business or known individual that gives credibility to the project, it really accelerates advocacy and believability but a lot of the big names at Tileyard London weren’t big names when they first moved in,” he says.

While looking out of a window at Tileyard London, he remembers the growth story of music technology company Spitfire Audio which launched as a start-up out of Tileyard with no employees. It now employs over 100 people.  

“They started with a very small space and grew into a 10-person office, then took the floor, then they expanded into three floors. Now they’ve got an entire building. It’s a really good example of the type of journey that a lot of businesses have been on.”

“We will never struggle to attract jobs, where we really have to intervene is to make sure it’s the right jobs and right businesses. That’s why Tileyard North providing space to those types of businesses is key,” explains Elliott.

“We’re already seeing different companies wanting to be close to all this activity and starting to relocate, even companies that Tileyard previously had relationships with in London are following suit. It definitely feels like it’s snowballing now.”

The future 

The council’s next step for the creative industry is Wakefield Exchange, a £7.7m project to renovate an old market hall which will feature incubation spaces for creative and cultural organisations.

“There’s only three areas nationally that got this funding. We’re creating space for those real seedling start-up businesses who will then be able to take up other spaces at places like Tileyard and Production Park as they grow. We’re trying to make sure there’s that support for the creative industry through the whole journey.”

Despite “lots of bumps” in the road, work has already started on the site and the hopes are it’ll offer more opportunities for creative businesses in need of space once it opens in 2024.

“We’re building a creative cluster. We want to drive further footfall into the city but we also want Exchange to show that creatives can work together right there in Wakefield city along with other organisations and we can grow our economy through creativity,” adds Russell.

As Wakefield gears up to celebrate a year in culture, although it’s a pivotal moment for Wakefield she recognises there’s still “more to do”.

“Whether they live, work or study here, we want creatives to feel that they are very much part of the future of Wakefield because they’ve been part of our history and they should be part of our future.”