Gateshead 

Arriving from the south Gateshead tends to be the first part of the industrial conurbation that you hit. Whether you come by road or rail Britain’s largest sculpture, the Angel of North, greets you from a commanding hilltop site that was once a colliery pithead.

Gateshead has enjoyed a renaissance recently, which culminated in it being forwarded as a candidate for European Capital of Culture 2008. The £250million redevelopment of the Quays area, which now features an international centre for contemporary art BALTIC, and the construction of the unique, design-led Millennium Bridge are at the heart of the area’s revival.

Gateshead is also the home of one of the country’s mega-shopping precincts, the MetroCentre, which only a handful of places, such as Manchester’s Trafford Centre and Lakeside at Thurrock, can match for size and variety.