REGENERATION Versus GENTRIFICATION LS28 5UJ [Postcode of Sunny Bank Mills, Leeds], 2026

This embossed, double-sided artistbook scroll is part of Sumi Perera’s ongoing series on the effects of gentrification. It shows how good architectural principles and careful planning, especially for buildings dedicated to arts and crafts, can regenerate an area under the pressures of rapid urbanisation. The work is dedicated to Sunny Bank Mills in Farsley, Leeds. The textile mill was built in 1912 and is now an exhibition space, shop and education centre, and it has been the filming location of BBC’s The Great British Sewing Bee since 2013. Perera has exhibited her series The Top Ten White Collar Crimes there; both bodies of work address the greed of property developers and financiers. The piece also draws parallels with the Kentler building, with its history in haberdashery and its present life on a busy commercial avenue.

Seven recycled zinc plates, deeply bitten in acid and aquatinted, are staggered across two sheets joined by a flattened “gutter.” They represent John Ruskin’s The Seven Lamps of Architecture, his principles of architectural ethics. Incisions, cut-outs and stitching cast shadows. The thermochromic ink changes colour with touch or heat, and the UV thread glows under a UV torch. Ideally the scroll is suspended so both sides can be seen. If it hangs against a wall, viewers are invited to lift it to see the back.

Supplied with two magnetic wooden beams for hanging.