The Star has spoken to Council Leader Tom Hunt and local entrepreneur James O'Hara ahead of the official opening of Leah's Yard.
The historic building has been reborn for the modern era to include local businesses, both creative and corporate.
Leah's Yard is opening as part of the Heart of the City project in Sheffield city centre.
The historic building has been reborn for the modern era to include local businesses, both creative and corporate.
Leah's Yard is opening as part of the Heart of the City project in Sheffield city centre.
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00:00Lejade is fantastic. I mean if you'd been standing on this spot 50 years ago you would have been
00:05surrounded by silversmiths, by people working in traditional Sheffield manufacturing crafts
00:11in these little mesters workshops and today it's been transformed, Lejade, into a new home
00:19for independent retail and workspaces right in the heart of our city and it's the latest piece
00:27in the redevelopment of the city centre and a key part of the heart of the city development.
00:34It's a new home for making and creating very much keeping in the spirit of the creating that took
00:40place here but just updated for 2024 and with many years of success ahead of it I'm absolutely
00:47sure. This is a grade two listed building that has frankly been hiding in plain sight on Cambridge
00:54Street for many years and I think people would be really impressed when they walk through the
00:59gate to see what is here. The transformation that we've been able to do with the team here over the
01:06last few years has been so successful that Historic England have now removed Lejade
01:12from their buildings at risk register. So it's been a long old project so we've been doing this
01:17for me and Tom have been doing this for four years but the project's been going on probably
01:22nine years. I think the scaffold got put up nine years ago and it's been an amazing journey seeing
01:28this building come back to life. Obviously being born and bred in Sheffield places like this hold
01:35a lot of heritage and a lot of feelings for people but what we wanted to make sure was that we
01:42used the space in a way that was going to make it relevant for the next 50 years rather than
01:46kind of looking back too much. And mine and Tom's part of this story is basically over so when we
01:52open it's all about the people who have got units here and be that Pete McKee or Le Biblioteka,
01:58Hop Hideout, Mester's Market, all of them. They've worked incredibly hard over the last few months to
02:04get ready for this point. And I thought that's quite a poignant way of looking at it in terms
02:10of your involvement in this and heavy involvement is effectively over. What's that like then because
02:15now you know 10 o'clock tomorrow you're handing over to the guys officially that are working here,
02:20what's that like for you? It's a relief. That's our job right, our job was to be custodians of this
02:30amazing building and get it ready for everyone else and now it's about those people and it's
02:36about the public, it's about Sheffield, it's about this building that's steeped in Sheffield history
02:41and heritage being accessible now again after years and years of being derelict.