Huge new live entertainment venue planned for Sheffield city centre

The former Bethel Chapel on Cambridge Street, opposite John Lewis, would be converted into Sheffield’s newest performing arts site, as part of a £470 overhaul of the city centre.

More details have been released as Sheffield Council and its development partner Queensberry seek occupiers to run the venue, a food hall and a host of other exciting new additions to the area.

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Applications are now open to take over the new and revamped buildings planned at Block H, surrounded by Wellington Street, Carver Street and Cambridge Street, of the sprawling Heart of the City II redevelopment.

As well as the former Bethel Chapel building, previously occupied by Stone the Crows, the block comprises the old workshops at Leah’s Yard and a proposed 20,000sqft industrial-style space to be known as Cambridge Street Collective (CSC).

The council and Queensberry this week announced: “As of today, the leasing team are now actively looking for tenant offers on key elements of the site – including CSC and Bethel Chapel – as well as welcoming early expressions of interest on the planned refurbishment of Leah’s Yard. All three elements are being designed and delivered to an advanced shell-and-core finish.”

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They said CSC would be ‘perfectly suited to a food hall or similar sociable, communal offer’ and an operator was being sought to ‘promote, manage and sublet all the internal space’.

For Bethel Chapel, they said the chosen operator would be responsible for ‘curating events and social activities’.

They added that plans for Leah’s Yard remained at an ‘embryonic stage’ but the vision is for the workshops to be ‘reimagined as creative ‘makers’ hubs, with a distinct Sheffield identity’.

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A planning application for the block has been submitted and it is hoped construction will begin later this year and be completed by 2022.

Queensberry said the search for applicants was part of steps ‘enabling us to be ready to hit the ground running this summer’.

“We are confident in attracting leasehold food and beverage and leisure tenants of real originality and quality to help bring our vision to life,” it added.