John Hansard Gallery is proud to be a City Partner of Southampton UK City of Culture Bid 2025.

What is UK City of Culture?

The UK City of Culture 2025 competition, delivered by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) in collaboration with the devolved administrations, uses culture as a catalyst for levelling up areas outside London and putting new parts of the UK on the cultural map internationally. The winner, announced later this year, will take on the baton from Coventry as the 2021 UK City of Culture and be at the centre of the UK’s cultural spotlight in 2025.

What winning the title would mean for Southampton

For the winning city, the benefits of the title are huge, attracting millions of visitors and investment and bringing communities together to showcase the place where they live to the country and the world. Throughout the history of this competition, the winning cities have always benefited from financial support to ensure the programme’s success and lasting legacy. Coventry has received over £15.5 million from the Government to directly support its year as UK City of Culture.

Southampton has worked hard over the past two years to understand and consult with businesses, organisations, communities and residents, to develop a bid that is from, and for, the people of Southampton. Work to date has seen a huge coming together of organisations and communities throughout the city and beyond with over 130 organisations and 9 neighbouring local authorities committing their support.

The longlist and next steps

Southampton is one step closer to becoming UK City of Culture 2025, having secured its place in September 2021 as one of the eight longlisted locations, out of twenty expressions of interest, to become UK City of Culture 2025.

Claire Whitaker OBE, Bid Director, Southampton 2025 UK City of Culture bid said: “We are delighted that Southampton has been chosen to go through to the next stage of the bid to be UK City of Culture 2025. The way that Southampton has come together to get behind our bid is unprecedented for our city, and I want to thank everyone for their belief and unwavering support. We now move forward with confidence and optimism to the next chapter of our story to become UK City of Culture in 2025.”

The full application was submitted on 6 February 2022. After this, a short-list of four locations will be announced in March, with judges visiting those shortlisted ahead of the winner being declared in May 2022.

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