I’d been wanting to get back to Bradford for some more dusk shots for a while, as I’ve not been since the scaffolding came down from the City Hall, so I picked a nice sunny day last week and set off in time to get some sunlit architectural images in the afternoon before my dusk shoot.

Walking from the railway station the shadow of the Bradford lettering in one of the street lamps caught my eye across the street on the Great Victoria Hotel so I couldn’t resist taking a shot of that!

Down at the City Hall I wondered what was going on as there was a huge crowd in Centenary Square in front of the building, with TV and press photographers included – it turned out that William and Kate were visiting Bradford that day and were due to leave the City Hall soon!  There was no way of getting to the front to see them emerge from the building, so I spent some time photographing it reflected in the Mirror Pool in City Park before joining the throng to watch the Royals speed away in the car (I caught a glimpse of Kate’s hand waving through the window…)

As Kate and William drove on to their next appointment in the city, I strolled off on mine – towards Little Germany for some more Victorian architecture.  Eastbrook Hall looked lovely in the sunshine – though strictly not Victorian, being built in 1903.  Round the corner on Vicar Lane the old warehouse buildings looked great too, with the low winter sun just catching the upper floors.  Nearby, the Grade I listed Bradford Cathedral looked lovely in the winter sunshine.

As the sun dipped lower and the light faded on the buildings I headed back to the centre via The Broadway shopping centre, which I had photographed before when it first opened but now seemed rather uninteresting architecturally, so I found a cafe near the Wool Exchange and had coffee whilst waiting for dusk to set in and the street lights to come on.  The forecast had been for clear skies all afternoon, but out of nowhere it tipped it down while I was in the cafe!  The shower blew over quite quickly and the sky cleared again, leaving some nice reflective wet pavements for the dusk shoot…

The Wool Exchange, another amazing Grade I listed building in Venetian gothic style, looked lovely as the street lamps came on and blue hour set in.

From the Wool Exchange I headed back to Centenary Square to photograph the City Hall.  In honour of William and Kate’s visit the amazing Tuscan style campanile had been illuminated with red, white and blue lights which looked great against the deepening blue of the sky, with the wet cobbles of Centenary Square in the foreground.  It looked great reflected in the mirror pool again too!

Before the sky got too dark I crossed the busy road to the Science and Media Museum – not my favourite modern building, but it still looked rather good at dusk and I noticed that the top floor of the concrete block next door also had red, white and blue lighting.

I finished off with a few image of the Alhambra Theatre, a Bradford landmark with its domed turret – and very brightly lit at night!

There are lots more images from this shoot in the West Yorkshire gallery on the website!