Sheffield in danger of losing 'kettles', heritage group warns

Sheffielders have described it as "alien-shaped" and like "kettles" - and now the former National Centre for Popular Music could be consigned to history as campaigners say it is at risk of being bulldozed.

- Mimi Ibrahim

The structure, soon to be vacated by its current occupant, is one of three in the UK built around the turn of the millennium to feature on the annual at-risk list from the charity Twentieth Century Society (C20).

It is the first time millennium-era projects have featured on the list, which highlights outstanding 20th and 21st-century buildings across the country at risk from demolition, dereliction or neglect.

Alongside Sheffield's former pop-themed visitor centre - which first opened in 1999 and closed 15 months later to headlines describing it as the "top of the flops" - the list contains the National Wildflower Centre in Knowsley (2000) and Archaeolink Prehistory Park in Aberdeenshire (1997), both of which have been abandoned.

Also featured is the brutalist east stand of St James' Park stadium in Newcastle, the wooden Grand National rollercoaster in Blackpool, which was opened in 1935, and Caerphilly's derelict Penallta Pithead Baths, built in 1938.