STREETS IN THE SKY | BILL STEPHENSON

22-25 FEB 2024 | 10AM - 5PM | VICTORIA HALL | FREE

Portraits of the Last Residents at Hyde Park Flats, Sheffield. 1988

Built on one of Sheffield’s reputed seven hills, the monumental, high rise, social housing development at Hyde Park was opened in 1966. 'Streets in the Sky' was a term derived from the wide open decks that defined this style of brutalist architecture.

My purpose was to photograph and record the last community of social housing tenants living at Hyde Park flats in 1988, before they were vacated during 1989-90 to provide accommodation for competitors at the 1991 World Student Games. 

Hyde Park was finally demolished between 1992-3, a landmark building that had dominated Sheffield’s skyline for over twenty years.

Further information about the construction of Hyde Park and my work can be found here

'Streets in the Sky' was published in 2023 by Revelations 23 Press and includes an essay by Johny Pitts. Available here

About Bill Stephenson

After I graduated with a degree in Fine Art from Sheffield City Polytechnic in 1982, I began my career as a social documentary and commercial photographer.

As a social documentary photographer I quickly developed a passion and commitment for photographing and recording communities of people who are often neglected, marginalised or considered unimportant. 

My aim was to describe these communities at a point in time with compassion and accuracy, but more importantly elevate them to a wider audience and in so doing giving them a voice. I always saw my role as an impartial representative that advocates their cause.

Once these photographic narratives were contemporary accounts, now they are historic documents. They are records of a time and place, and are especially relevant today as these communities no longer exist. 

These projects can viewed at: www.billstephenson.co.uk