Sydney Works or Sidney Works is a building on Matilda Street in Sheffield

Sheffield

Sheffield is a city and metropolitan borough of South Yorkshire, England. Its name derives from the River Sheaf, which runs through the city. Historically a part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, and with some of its southern suburbs annexed from Derbyshire, the city has grown from its largely...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. It has seen a variety of uses, and occupies a prominent site beside the Porter Brook

Porter Brook

The Porter Brook is a river in the City of Sheffield, Englanddescending over 300 metres from its source among the sedge grass on Burbage moor behind a small farm on Hangram just inside the Peak District National Park in the west of the city at Clough Hollow, near the village of Ringinglow...

, surrounded by car parks.

The site was originally occupied by the City Saw Mills. It was occupied by four back-to-back buildings

Back-to-back houses

Usually of low quality and high density, they were built for working class people and because three of the four walls of the house were shared with other buildings and therefore contained no doors or windows, back-to-back houses were notoriously ill-lit and poorly ventilated and sanitation was of...

 used until the 1970s by various small industrial

Industry

Industry refers to the production of an economic good or service within an economy.-Industrial sectors:There are four key industrial economic sectors: the primary sector, largely raw material extraction industries such as mining and farming; the secondary sector, involving refining, construction,...

 businesses, most prominently Deakins Silversmith

Silversmith

A silversmith is a craftsperson who makes objects from silver or gold. The terms 'silversmith' and 'goldsmith' are not synonyms as the techniques, training, history, and guilds are or were largely the same but the end product varies greatly as does the scale of objects created.Silversmithing is the...

s, later renamed Sydney Silversmiths.

The rear wing of the building was constructed in 1902.

In the 1970s, the building was used by a printing

Printing

Printing is a process for reproducing text and image, typically with ink on paper using a printing press. It is often carried out as a large-scale industrial process, and is an essential part of publishing and transaction printing....

 co-operative. From 1982 it was home to Yorkshire Artspace

Yorkshire ArtSpace

Yorkshire ArtSpace is a project established to provide studio space for artists which opened in October 2001 at the Persistence Works building in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England...

, which converted much of the space into studio

Studio

A studio is an artist's or worker's workroom, or the catchall term for an artist and his or her employees who work within that studio. This can be for the purpose of architecture, painting, pottery , sculpture, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, radio or television...

s, becoming the first cultural organisation in what later became the Cultural Industries Quarter

Cultural Industries Quarter

The Cultural Industries Quarter is a district in the city centre of Sheffield, England, and one of the eleven Quarters designated in the 1994 City Centre Strategy...

. In 2001, Yorkshire Artspace moved to purpose-built premises at Persistence Works, and the building stood largely empty, other than a small part used by a recording studio

Recording studio

A recording studio is a facility for sound recording and mixing. Ideally both the recording and monitoring spaces are specially designed by an acoustician to achieve optimum acoustic properties...

.

In 2005, the Works were used as a convergence centre for opposition to the G8

G8

The Group of Eight is a forum, created by France in 1975, for the governments of seven major economies: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. In 1997, the group added Russia, thus becoming the G8...

 Finance Minister

Finance minister

The finance minister is a cabinet position in a government.A minister of finance has many different jobs in a government. He or she helps form the government budget, stimulate the economy, and control finances...

s' meeting in Sheffield. Renamed the "Matilda

Matilda Centre

The Matilda Centre was a grassroots developed social and community centre in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England. It was housed in the derelict former Sydney Works building until June 2006 when, following the outcome of a court case ruling that they should be evicted, the collectives running the...

", it was then developed as a squat

Squatting

Squatting consists of occupying an abandoned or unoccupied space or building, usually residential, that the squatter does not own, rent or otherwise have permission to use....

ted social centre, including gig spaces, artists' studios, exhibition space, IT facilities, a cafe and several meeting spaces. In June 2006, Yorkshire Forward

Yorkshire Forward

Yorkshire Forward is the regional development agency for the Yorkshire and the Humber region of the United Kingdom. It supports the development of business in the region by encouraging public and private investment in education, skills, environment and infrastructure...

, who had acquired the building, secured a court order demanding the eviction of the occupants.