Gateshead

A crossing as old as Newcastle itself

Gateshead sits directly opposite Newcastle on the Tyne's south bank, and the two have been tied together by bridges — and rivalry — for centuries. Historically part of County Durham rather than Northumberland, Gateshead became an independent county borough in the late 19th century before joining the new county of Tyne and Wear in 1974, bringing with it Blaydon, Whickham, Felling, Birtley, Low Fell and several other former mining villages.

The exact origin of the name is debated — one old theory points to the Old English for "goat's head" — but whatever its roots, Gateshead's story has always run parallel to the river and the city across it.

Industry, from Team Valley to the Metrocentre

Gateshead's economy was built on coal, iron and heavy industry, and the 1930s Team Valley Trading Estate was one of the first planned industrial estates anywhere in Britain, built to bring jobs back after the Depression. Half a century later, the borough reinvented retail itself: the Metrocentre, opened in 1986 on the site of a former power station at Dunston, was Europe's largest shopping centre at the time and remains one of the biggest in the UK.

An angel, a bridge and a flour mill

No sculpture defines the modern North East quite like the Angel of the North, Antony Gormley's 20-metre, rust-coloured steel figure, unveiled in 1998 on the site of a former colliery pithead baths, its 54-metre wingspan visible for miles along the A1. Down on the Quayside, the tilting Gateshead Millennium Bridge (2001) links directly across to Newcastle, while the BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, opened in 2002 inside a converted 1950s flour mill, and Sage Gateshead's curved silver concert hall (2004) turned the riverside into one of England's most concentrated arts districts outside London.