Andrea Dunbar wrote brilliantly and vividly of the Bradford where she knew. We celebrated her singular voice with an unforgettable evening at St George’s Hall, where Erica Whyman directed staged readings from the Buttershaw-born playwright’s three dramas: The Arbor, Rita, Sue and Bob Too and Shirley.

The month also featured a rare UK screening of The Arbor, Clio Barnard’s extraordinary cinematic portrait of Dunbar – which concluded Barnard’s Northern Soul season celebrating Northern women on film.

Following February’s opening of the Ramadan Pavilion, our Ramadan celebrations continued with two Open Iftars, presented in collaboration with our dear friends at the Ramadan Tent Project. These two special events saw hundreds of people from all walks of life come together and break fast at One City Park – a powerful symbol of community, diversity and inclusivity in our district.

DRAW!, our nationwide drawing project supported by David Hockney, continued with a simple invitation from West Yorkshire artist Jason Wilsher-Mills to draw your favourite thing. You can see what people came up with in our online gallery.

We launched our Artist-Led Project Awards in 2024 to spread the UK City of Culture love far and wide across the district’s arts scene. More than 20 artists, collectives and arts organisations received funding of up to £15,000 to support the creation of a new project that would premiere during 2025 – and March saw the first two Artist-Led Projects come to fruition.

• Augmenting Bradford’s DNA saw calligrapher Razwan Ul-Haq create three new artworks using ink extracted from parts of the city, including bricks from local buildings, soil from Bradford City AFC and stones from local rivers of Bradford.
• HOPE/ACT was a new collection of murals celebrating Bradford 2025 created the Bradford-based People Powered Press, the largest letterpress printing press in the world.

Stay tuned in future months for news of more Bradford 2025 Artist-Led Projects.

Bradford 2025 was all over the BBC in March, including:

• Gardeners’ Question Time gave valuable guidance to green-fingered types up and down the country, and even visited a Manningham ginnel transformed by the Lister Community Action Group – listen in via BBC Sounds.
• My Life met Jaleel and Subhaan, two young boys who are mad about the sport of tent pegging – watch on BBC iPlayer.
• Jason Mohammad hosted Celebrity Eid from City Park, and also fronted an Eid Live broadcast from Bradford Central Mosque.

Our Patch, our year-long programme for the people of Bradford to take part in culture during 2025, enjoyed a packed month in March. There were dozens of free events and activities this month – including five DRAW! Tour workshops, inviting people to join us in their local community centre and get drawing. Other highlights included:

• In Bradford East – Creativity for wellbeing with the parents/carers of pupils at Co-op Delius Academy; arts, crafts and creative activities at Barkerend Family Hub, Woodroyd Centre and MAPA; and a Bug Ball created with Better Start Bradford.
• In Bradford South – A mosaic project promoting community pride in Holme Wood; The Travelling Spoon, a creative cooking project at the TFD Centre; and planning ahead of The Beacon’s arrival at Wibsey Park in April.
• In Bradford West – Wellbeing support for communities at Lower Grange Community Centre; a BSL storytelling project at Bradford New Church; and fun cultural sessions for South Asian women with disabilities at the Khidmat Centre.
• In Keighley and Ilkley – Work with people seeking sanctuary, in partnership with Good Shepherds and the Salvation Army; the Keighley Chorus hosting a drop-in choir at the Airedale Shopping Centre; and ’Ere to Ear’, a new social media platform promoting cultural activity in Keighley and Ilkley.
• In Shipley – Skills building through creativity with young people at the Bolton Woods Centre; creative sessions for disabled adults at NEET in Shipley and Unique Voices in Baildon; and art sessions at Denholme Youth Café.

Our hard-working Creative Engagement team was here, there and everywhere in March, inviting people of all ages and backgrounds across the district to get creative. Highlights included:

• Poetry workshops in seven schools, where more than 1,800 learners worked with professional poets to create their own performance poetry pieces on the theme of Play – ahead of an incredible summer Poetry Slam final at The Beacon.
• National Saturday Clubs launched two new creative clubs at Bradford College, with opportunities for young people to learn new skills in Performance & Theatre and Games Design.
• The BBC broadcast its World Book Day Live Lesson from Bradford – live online and on CBBC.
• Creative Briefs worked with a group of looked-after children for a three-day workshop dedicated to creative problem-solving activities – which led to them creating their own escape room.