Sheffield

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Sheffield’s Hidden Gems

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In front of you is one of the most interesting, inspiring and downright insightful destination guides there is.It’s part of our Rough Guide series, and it will help you swap the beaten track for an unbelievable trip.

You’ll discover hidden gems and best-kept secrets. It’s like having your own local tour guide, right there in your pocket. It even comes with your very own map. Get out there, explore and share your fi ndings on Facebook or Twitter on your glorious return.

There’s a full set of these Rough Guides, covering lots of amazing places across the north of England and Scotland. Book your next adventures online at tpexpress.co.uk and collect the whole set.

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5A Rough guide4

If you get peckish check out the menu, inspired by an American diner, which includes fried chicken, sliders and a chocolate brownie sundae topped with marshmallows (£3.75).

Formerly the heart of England’s heavy and specialist steel production, by the 1980s the downturn in the industry had tipped parts of Sheffield into dispiriting decline. The subsequent revival has been rapid, however, with the centre utterly transformed by flagship architectural projects and vibrant music and cultural scenes thrive year-round in this energetic, youthful city.

Sheffield

SHEFFIElD

APG16–20 Sidney Street S1 4RH Gmap T 0114 263 4493

W www.apgworks.co.uk H Mon–Fri 9.30am–5.30pm, Sat 11am–4pm

P free to browse

In a once-gloomy part of the city where graffiti and street art now brighten up long stretches of faded brickwork, this small, privately run gallery – formerly the Archipelago Gallery – offers a chance to meet some of Sheffield’s most creative artists, and view their work in regularly updated exhibitions. If you don’t see anyone around in the courtyard, just ring the bell by the door and you’ll be invited in to look around the studios, which

are housed in an old silver-plating factory that’s been painted and puttied to give it a new lease of life.

Inside the higgledy-piggledy rooms are original screen prints by local artists, plus t-shir ts and bags that have been custom printed with logos. The main theme is affordability (framed, handmade screen prints by respected local illustrators go for around £100) although there also seems to be a preference for vivid, comic-book

style designs. Everything is for sale, and it’s likely you’ll see artists at work during your visit, so it’s worth taking time to browse the different parts of the gallery. As you browse

Bungalows and BearsThe Old Fire Station, 50 Division St S1 1RU Gmap

T 0114 279 2901 W www.bungalowsandbears.com H Mon–Thurs noon–

midnight, Fri–Sat noon–1.30am, Sun noon–midnight

Bungalows and Bears makes the most of its location in an old fire station, whose glass doors face out onto Division Street, one of the most student-friendly parts of the city. With a big, sweeping bar and a selection of squidgy sofas arranged where the fire engines were once kept, it’s a good spot for a cheap, early evening drink. On Tuesdays, the kitchen runs two-for-one burger deals.

Drinks and food aside, it’s the events that really make Bungalows and Bears an interesting place to hang out. As well as fairly typical Friday nights that see DJs keeping the young crowd of drinkers happy, this bar-club also hosts live bands, movie nights, quizzes and Sunday evening swing sessions.

you might notice the friendly black dog, Sapper, following you from room to room. The artists here also offer a framing service for works purchased elsewhere.

A Rough guide 76 SHEFFIElD

Kelham Island Brewery23 Alma Street S3 8SA Gmap T 0114 249 4804

W www.kelhambrewery.co.uk H Standard tours Mon–Sat, pre-booking

required (minimum 10 people per group) P standard tours £15 per person;

tours including food (pie and peas) £20 per person

Small, independently run breweries are one of Sheffield's star attractions, and there are a couple of places that invite visitors to look around and find out how the production process works. One of the best, the Kelham Island Brewery, sits on an islet that was created 800 years ago when water was diverted from the River Don to drive a corn mill further downstream.

Book in advance and join a short tour that starts with a pint of one of the brewery’s real ales in a modern bar, purpose-built for the tours, and

continues with a walk around the small brewing operation. At the end of the tour (usually lasting between 45 and 60 minutes, the group returns to the bar, where a couple more beers are waiting to be swilled. There’s a fair selection too – the brewery turns out five main beers plus two specials every month.

Close by is the Kelham Island Museum (simt.co.uk; adults £4.50), which focuses on Sheffield’s industrial past. The most popular exhibit here is the River Don Engine, a colossal beast of a steam engine

that helped Sheffield produce armour plating for dreadnought ships. It still works, and is fired up twice a day for visitors, costing the museum around £150 a time. Many other items of heritage machinery at the museum are still in operation too, and craftspeople show how they were used in their period workshops.

La Mama238 Abbeydale Road S7 1FL Gmap T 0114 327 9597

W www.lamama-sheffield.blogspot.co.uk H Mon–Sat 6pm–late

When the Valeria family moved from Chile to Sheffield in 1976, there wasn’t a single latin American restaurant in the city. Now there are around half a dozen. la Mama, the restaurant that the Valeria family founded, is still the most authentic place around, serving up more than 25 hot and cold tapas dishes (most items £4–£6) in relaxed, surroundings. If you don’t want the hassle of ordering lots of small

dishes, go for one of the ‘fiesta’ set meals.

Terracotta walls filled with photos of vivid landscapes give the place a warm feeling, even when it’s chilly outside. If you want to feel even more sunshine, head to one of the regular live music nights – the focus is on latin American beats; check website for forthcoming events – and drink in the atmosphere with some friends and a jug of sangria.

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The Leadmill6 Leadmill Road S1 4SE Gmap T 0114 221 2828 W www.leadmill.co.uk

H Generally 11am–3am, see event schedule for exact times; closed Sun

Venues and clubs come and go, but the leadmill, founded in 1980, is still the go-to nightspot for any act wanting to play live in Sheffield. It has, after all, hosted some of the most successful British bands of the last thirty years, including Coldplay, Oasis, Muse and the Manic Street Preachers. Keep an eye on the website and you might catch a big-name artist or promising up-and-comer.

The Rude Shipyard89 Abbeydale Rd, S7 1FE Gmap T 0114 258 9653

W www.therudeshipyard.com H Thurs–Tues 10am–4pm

Abbeydale Road is an eclectic part of Sheffield, home to Italian delis, Indian restaurants and Caribbean fast-food joints. So it’s fitting that The Rude Shipyard, a carefully curated café-cum-bookshop that encourages people to meet and integrate, is at the centre of a lot of the goings-on.

One of the nicest things about the café is its layout; there are three small rooms, separated by a creaky staircase, which have

The crowd varies depending on who’s playing, but the club nights held here after the bands have finished are a big hit with students, who come for the cheap shots, free sweets and gig-ticket giveaways. Don’t expect rock and indie every night of the week, though; different parts of the 1,150-capacity venue are often filled with the sounds of soul, Motown, and pop.

a cosy, lounge-like feel to them. There’s a good selection of books, both used and new, and at the counter downstairs you’ll find freshly baked cakes being sold by the slice. With strong coffee brewing and vinyl crackling on the record player, it’s a good place to start the day. At lunchtime, sandwiches stuffed with tasty veggie fillings like goat’s cheese, beetroot and rocket cost just £3.50 to take away.

A Rough guide 1110 SHEFFIElD

Sheffield Round WalkTo get to Endcliffe Park Gmap take bus #81 from Furnival Gate (a 5-minute

walk from the station) towards Greystones/Bents Green. Maps (£3.95) are

available from the council offices at Meersbrook Park, 2.5 miles south of the

city centre, or through the website. T 0114 250 0500 W www.sheffield.gov.uk

(small charge for postage applies)

If the hustle and bustle of the centre gets too much, try walking some (or all) of the Sheffield Round Walk, a fourteen-mile route through some of the greenest sections of the city. Starting at Endcliffe Park, a couple of miles southwest of the railway station, and looping south via Ringinglow and Meadowhead, the circular route takes ramblers through woodlands, parks and gardens.

The main attraction is being in green space so near to the city, but there are plenty of things worth

Tamper Coffee9 Westfield Terrace S1 4GH Gmap

T 0114 327 1080

W www.tampercoffee.co.uk H Mon–

Fri 8am–4:30pm, Sat 9am–4pm, Sun

10am–4pm. Kitchen closes at 3pm.

Started by a New Zealander who moved to the UK in 2011, Tamper Coffee aims to serve top-notch drinks in the kind of relaxed café environment that wouldn’t look out of place in Wellington or Christchurch. Don’t come expecting to see New Zealand flags all over the place; references to Kiwi culture are subtle and unexpected, like the New Zealand-style steak pies on the menu, which sell for £3.95 each.

The café itself is a small and simple space, with bench seats covered in burlap coffee sacks and metal-framed stools that look as though they’ve been borrowed from a school science laboratory. lunchtimes are popular, as people queue for the ever-changing soup of the day (prices vary). Occasional evening events that run from 5pm–10.30pm are also popular, providing a nice

stopping off for along the way. Near the southernmost stretch, for instance, it’s possible to look around a medieval abbey built in 1176, or wander through an industrial hamlet which, in the eighteenth century, was alive with the clanging sounds of the toolmakers’ trade. If you have the legs for it, it’s possible to walk the entire fourteen miles in one a day. Do take a map though (available through the council website here); local pranksters have a habit of pinching the signs that point the way.

booze-free alternative to the pub. If you get a taste for the coffee (and it is very good, with just the right amount of chocolaty bitterness) then £3.50 will buy you a 100g bag of ground beans to take away.

first transPennine TipHead to the Devonshire

Quarter for a mix of independent music

stores, coffee shops, bars and fabulous fashion

boutiques.

A Rough guide12 13SHEFFIElD

The Winter Garden and Millennium GalleriesWinter Garden: Surrey St Gmap H Mon–Sat 8am–8pm, Sun 8am–6pm

Millennium Galleries: Arundel Gate W www.museums-sheffield.org.uk

H Mon–Sat 10am–5pm, Sun 11am–4pm P free

The unexpected, striking architecture of the Winter Garden – just a minute’s walk from the town hall and Peace Gardens – is a potent symbol of Sheffield’s regeneration. At

230ft long and 70ft high and wide, it’s essentially a twenty-first-century version of a Victorian conservatory on a grand scale. It’s created from unvarnished, slowly weathering

wood and polished glass and is filled with more than 2000 seasonally changing plants and towering trees.

Backing onto this vast glasshouse, the Millennium galleries consist of the Metalwork Gallery, devoted to the city’s world-famous cutlery industry including an introduction to the processes involved and a collection of fine silver and stainless steel cutlery, and the diverting Ruskin Gallery. Based on the cultrural collection founded by John Ruskin in 1875 to “improve” the working people of Sheffield, this includes manuscripts, minerals, watercolours and drawings all relating in some way to the natural world.

CreditsAuthor: Steve VickersEditing and Picture research: Ian BlenkinsopDesign & layout: Anthony Limerick and Ann CanningsProject manager: Ian BlenkinsopAccount manager (First TransPennine): Caroline AnchorAccount manager (Rough Guides): Michael Stanfield

For this edition:Factcheckers: Keith Munro, Steve VickersSenior editor: Ros Walford Senior prepress designer: Daniel MaySenior digital producer Sean Daly

First published 2013This second edition published May 2014 by Rough Guides Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL© Rough Guides Ltd, 2013ISBN 978-0-2411-8328-1

The publishers and authors have done their best to ensure the accuracy and currency of all the information contained in Rough Guides’ Hidden Gems: Sheffield, however, they can accept no responsibility for any loss, injury or inconvenience sustained as a result of information or advice contained in the guide.

Picture creditsAll illustrations are © First TransPennine Express. All photography is © Rough Guides except for the following: Bungalows and bears © Katie Dane / Bungalows and Bears; Kelham Island © cooldudeandy01 / Wikimedia Commons; La Mama © La Mama Latin Tapas Bar and Restaurant; Leadmill © Redferns via Getty Images; Rude Shipyard © Marek Payne / Rude Shipyard; Sheffield Walk © Brzi/iStockphoto; Tamper Coffee © Tamper Coffee; Winter Gardens © Sheena Woodhead/iStockphoto.