Sheffield is more photogenic than it tends to get credit for. The combination of Victorian industrial heritage, brutalist architecture, green spaces, and the Peak District backdrop gives it a visual range that other cities lack. These are the spots worth knowing about.

Kelham Island gives you Sheffield’s industrial heritage at its most photogenic. The old cutlery workshops and steel buildings along the island itself, the canal sections, the Kelham Island Tavern sign, and the general atmosphere of a genuinely old industrial neighbourhood in the process of becoming something new – all of it shoots well, particularly in low winter light or the golden hour before sunset. The Kelham Island Museum exterior is the set piece, but the streets around it are equally good for exploring with a camera.

Park Hill flats are the contentious one – a Grade II* listed brutalist social housing block on the hillside above the train station that divides opinion in Sheffield as strongly as any building in the country. Architecturally, it is extraordinary, and photographically it is remarkable whether you find it beautiful or alarming. The scale of the building, the repeated geometric pattern of the walkways and windows, and the \”I love you will u marry me\” graffiti that has become part of Sheffield’s visual identity all reward the climb up the hill for a view. The regenerated end of the block, where the original concrete has been replaced with coloured glass panels, has its own particular quality.

Endcliffe Park in autumn, when the mature trees along the Porter Brook path turn, is a reliable picture. The light through tree canopy on a clear October morning is the kind of photograph that makes Sheffield look like the city nature intended it to be.

Stanage Edge gives you the Peak District shot from Sheffield – 30 minutes by car and you are on top of a gritstone escarpment with Sheffield visible in the distance on one side and open moorland on the other. The dawn light on the edge in summer has been photographed thousands of times and remains worth doing yourself. The Peace Gardens fountain in the city centre is the urban landscape option – the surrounding civic architecture frames it well on a busy afternoon.