The End of Sovereign House: A New Chapter for Norwich and Anglia Square

During Spring 2026, North Norwich is changing forever. The rhythmic thud of machinery now defines the air around Anglia Square, as the long-awaited demolition of Anglia Square and Sovereign House reaches its final stages.
For decades, this Brutalist icon stood as a polarising landmark of our "Fine City." Designed by architect Alan Cooke Associates and completed in the late 1960s, it was an unapologetic example of Brutalist architecture, a movement defined by raw concrete (béton brut), modular forms, and a "form follows function" honesty. To many architectural historians, it was a masterpiece of post-war optimism; to others, a derelict eyesore.

The derelict shell remains of Sovereign House, and Anglia Square the week before demolition.

A Brutalist Utopian Vision in Concrete
My ongoing series of photos capture the demolition and regeneration of a site that once housed over 800 workers at Her Majesty’s Stationery Office (HMSO). Watching the iconic spiral glass staircases being dismantled feels like the end of a specific, utopian vision for post-war Norwich.
The building’s significance lay in its structural rhythm—those heavy concrete piers and recessed windows were designed to bring a sense of civic permanence to the north of the city. As the demolition team makes its way through the site, we are losing one of the most significant examples of 20th-century brutalist architecture in East Anglia.

Norwich’s artistic hub. Remembering Outpost Studios
The physical demolition is only half the story; the loss of Outpost Studios at Gildengate House has left a significant void in our local culture. Since 2010, this space was a vital "ecology" for nearly 100 painters, sculptors, and filmmakers who underpinned the city's creative scene.
The eviction in early 2025 was described by resident artists as "devastating," with many forced to relocate as far as Great Yarmouth to find comparable, affordable workshops. While some found temporary sanctuary at Carrow House, the "dissolving" of this supportive community serves as a sober reminder that urban regeneration often comes at the cost of the very grassroots culture that makes an area vibrant.

Looking Forward: The Future of the Site

So, what follows the rubble? With the demolition scheduled to wrap up this spring, the focus shifts to a £350 million redevelopment led by Norwich City Council and Aviva Capital Partners. The site is set to be transformed into a modern urban quarter that will bring huge changes to my home NR3 district of Norwich North featuring:

• 1,100 New Homes: With a commitment that at least 50% will be affordable in the initial phases.

• Retail & Leisure: Including a replacement multi-screen cinema and an anchor food store.

• St Saviour’s Yard 'Box Park': A vibrant container village near Magdalen Street designed to house small businesses and creatives during the transition.

• Phased Delivery: Construction is slated to begin in Spring 2026, with the first residents expected by 2028.

While the dilapidated state of the old square is finally being cleared, the hope is that this new chapter will respect the heritage of the area while providing the much-needed housing and economic injection Norwich deserves.

This is an ongoing project blog, I will be adding more as the site evolves.

Best wedding venues in Norfolk — a photographer's guide

Norfolk is one of England's most photogenic counties for weddings. Big skies, medieval architecture, country estates, grand hotels, and intimate village churches all sit within easy reach of Norwich. As a Norfolk wedding photographer who has shot across the county for years, I've put together this guide to some of the best wedding venues Norfolk has to offer—and what makes each one special from behind the lens.
Whether you're planning a grand country house celebration, an intimate city ceremony, or something genuinely alternative, Norfolk has a venue to match your vision.

Norwich Castle and the Norwich Registry Office

Norwich Castle is one of the most distinctive wedding backdrops in the whole of East Anglia. The Norman keep sits high above the city, giving couples access to dramatic stone architecture, sweeping views over Norwich, and a setting that feels genuinely historic. The Norwich Registry Office—located inside the castle complex—handles the legal ceremony, and many couples choose to use the castle grounds for portraits immediately after.
For photographers, the light around the castle changes beautifully throughout the day. The pale stone catches warm evening light perfectly, and the elevated position means you're rarely fighting with crowds in the background. If you're looking for a Norwich wedding venue that combines city convenience with real architectural drama, the Castle deserves to be at the top of your list.
Best for: Couples who want something iconic, urban, and a little unconventional.

The Norfolk Mead Hotel

The Norfolk Mead Hotel near Coltishall is one of my personal favourite Norfolk wedding venues to photograph. Set in beautiful grounds on the banks of the River Bure, it offers an intimacy and elegance that larger venues can't always match. The bridge on the grounds is a genuinely stunning location for couple portraits—the combination of the water, the willow trees, and the soft Norfolk light makes for images that are hard to beat.

The hotel itself is a Georgian country house, which means there's real character in every corner—from the refined interiors to the walled garden. It works beautifully for both small and medium-sized weddings, and the team there are excellent to work with.
Best for: Romantic, intimate weddings with a countryside feel near Norwich.

Dunston Hall

Dunston Hall is one of Norfolk's most established dedicated wedding venues, and for good reason. The Victorian Gothic manor house sits in over 150 acres of parkland just south of Norwich, giving couples access to sweeping lawns, woodland walks, and a beautifully grand interior. It's a venue that handles larger weddings with ease, and the experienced events team makes the whole day run smoothly. From a photography perspective, the grounds offer real variety—formal gardens for group shots, woodland paths for relaxed couple portraits, and the striking exterior of the Hall itself for arrival shots. The interior spaces are equally impressive for indoor portraits if the Norfolk weather turns.
Best for: Larger weddings, traditional celebrations, and those wanting a classic Norfolk country house experience.

Oaklands Hotel, Norwich

Oaklands Hotel in Norwich is a popular choice for couples who want a full wedding day in the city with all the convenience that brings. The hotel offers flexible packages for ceremonies and receptions, and its function spaces can accommodate a wide range of wedding sizes. The grounds include pleasant outdoor areas for drinks receptions and informal portraits.
For couples working with a sensible budget without compromising on a professional hotel wedding experience, Oaklands is a solid and well-regarded choice in the Norwich wedding venue market.
Best for: City weddings, flexible budgets, and guests travelling from further afield who need on-site accommodation.

Norwich Cathedral

Norwich Cathedral is one of the finest Norman cathedrals in England, and being married here is a genuinely unforgettable experience. The cathedral's soaring nave, medieval cloisters, and extraordinary stained glass create a setting of rare beauty. It is a Church of England venue, so couples will need the appropriate qualifying connection, but for those who do, it's among the most spectacular wedding locations in the UK.
As a photographer, shooting in Norwich Cathedral requires care and skill—the interior light is complex, ranging from deep shadows to sharp shafts of light. But when it comes together, the results are extraordinary.
Best for: Couples with a strong faith tradition who want a grand, historic cathedral setting.

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Norwich Catholic Cathedral (St John the Baptist)

The Cathedral Church of St John the Baptist—Norwich's Catholic Cathedral—is a stunning Victorian Gothic building. Designed by George Gilbert Scott Jr., it has an atmosphere of real drama and grandeur.
Catholic weddings here follow the full Nuptial Mass, which gives photographers a longer, richer ceremony to document—full of ritual, light, and genuine emotion. The stained glass and stone interior create beautiful, atmospheric conditions for documentary wedding photography.
Best for: Catholic couples wanting a grand, architecturally dramatic venue within the city.

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Village Church Weddings in Norfolk

Norfolk is blessed with an extraordinary number of beautiful medieval parish churches—more than any other county in England. A village church wedding in Norfolk feels deeply rooted in local history. Flint walls, round towers, and the sound of bells across open countryside create an atmosphere that no hotel ballroom can replicate.

The advantage for couples is the sheer variety—from tiny flint churches on the edge of salt marshes to grander parish churches in market towns. From a photography perspective, these churches are a joy: natural light, ancient textures, and the surrounding countryside all contribute to images that feel genuinely timeless.
Best for: Traditional Norfolk weddings with deep local roots and historic character.

Kimberley Hall

Kimberley Hall is one of Norfolk's hidden gems. This eighteenth-century Palladian mansion sits in a private parkland estate near Wymondham and is available for exclusive hire. The interiors are grand and historically significant, providing a sense of total privacy.
For photography, Kimberley Hall is exceptional. The Palladian architecture, formal grounds, and the parkland beyond offer extraordinary variety. Whether you want grand formal portraits or relaxed, wandering couple sessions in the countryside, it delivers both. It’s also a fantastic location for alternative fashion and editorial-style wedding shoots.
Best for: Couples wanting an exclusive, grand country house estate with total privacy and historic elegance.

Planning your Norfolk wedding photography

Whichever Norfolk wedding venue you choose, the photography deserves as much thought as the venue itself. I'm Magpie Tommy — a Norwich-based wedding photographer with a background in fashion and fine art photography. My approach blends honest documentary photography with contemporary, fashion-inspired portrait work. I work across all of the venues in this guide, and I'm always happy to meet for a coffee and talk through your plans.
My wedding photography packages start from £300, with full day coverage from £800. I cover weddings across Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire and beyond — and I'm available for destination weddings too.

Get in touch here — I'd love to hear about your plans.

Three In One

Natasha Kalashnikova visited my home town of Norwich, Norfolk recently, 
 to make things easier she borrowed my guest room, and we shot some cool stuff on the last afternoon. 
 

Having just set up my home studio I was keen to try it out. But she really liked my location work. 
With a bit of planning we managed to cram a lot into an afternoon.

 
Dark Virtue Designs kindly supplied us with the latex bikini set at short notice. 
 We finished up jumping in the car and heading out to shoot in a derelict building hidden in some Norfolk woodland known as "The Witch’s’ House"

Dark Future

This was the last stop on our euro tour, and we were looking forward to a lie-in before catching the ferry.  Having got up early and shot two or three locations a day and clocked up some serious miles.

  This and Chateau Noisy had both been on  my bucket list for a while, and I  was really happy to find the "Rino" almost straight away.

 Roswell's outfit is a one-off from German designer Cybersque. I had been a fan of her work for a while and I picked this location especially to go with her designs.

This set was published in Avant Fashion Magazine. 

Dead Sperm Whale

Recently 23 whales have been stranded across the beaches of Northern Europe and may have come from a single whale pod.  Normally Sperm whales do not enter the north sea as they hunt deep sea squid.  It was a rare and very sad to have the opportunity to photograph the one washed up at Hunstanton.
 However according to marine biologists, there may be an upside.
 “For individual animals, this is certainly a bad thing, but when we get more strandings, that tends to correlate with population recovery.” Paul Jepson of the Cetacean Strandings Investigation Program at the Zoological Society of London. 
 There was a lot of media talk of trophy hunters and people being disrespectful. When we visited there was steady stream of people coming and going and everyone was curious and respectful.
 However due to an earlier incident the lower jaw had been removed by vets to prevent anyone attempting to remove the teeth.  
 As we were about ten minutes into our walk back to the car we heard the most almighty bang.  Followed by a rancid stench of rotting flesh with a sickly sweet after taste. 
 We looked back and could see people’s torches still moving so we knew they were ok, but probably in need of some new clothes and a long bath. 
 For more information on whale and marine conservation and the fight against illegal fishing and whaling check out the work of Sea Shepherd. 

Other World

Jade Stacy Maria and Roswell Ivory modelling latex by Dead Lotus Couture, in an abandoned office block with a double helix stairwell. 
 The photos that James Kerwin  and I took here were published in Kultur Magazine.

I really wanted to get this last shot wearing one of the outfits, but the floor was so wet and grimy it would have ruined the latex.

Cooling Tower Return With Roswell Ivory.

 I came here  in Sep 2013, on my first Euro photography road trip.
I knew it would be an interesting place for a fashion shoot, with unusual big soft overhead light and geometric shapes.
 As we realised we were close by, on our way to somewhere else, Roswell and I made a quick detour to shoot a location art nude set. Which was later published in NIF magazine.  
 Blog about the location and first visit. 
 

Castle Miranda / Château de Noisy

 This location had been on my bucket list for a couple of years. 
I came to with Roswell Ivory  to shoot for . 
More about that here. 
 We were warned off on our first attempt, but we succeeded the next day. Although no one was happy about meeting in the hotel lobby at 5am it was definitely worth it. 

 A fairytale castle, Castle Miranda, aka Château de Noisy stands abandoned and crumbling on large hill in near the Belgium / France border. Built between 1855 and 1866 by English architect Edward Milner, under the instructions of the Liedekerke-Beaufort family The castle began life as a summer home but was then claimed by German troop during WW2, at the battle of the Bulge. After the war the Belgian National Railway Company used the building as a school and holiday home for the children of the Belgian railway employees, until the late 1970′s. Closing its doors in 1991 reportedly due to the heavy financial burden of the upkeep and maintenance.  The Count and owner of the property then decided to dismantle a lot of the remaining fixtures, leaving it to decay and vandalism.

Death Nest With Rebecca Bathory

I got to know Rebecca Bathory Photography while shooting in Chernobyl and Pripyat, I’ve liked her photography for a long time, so it was a real honour when she said she wanted to pose for me. I contacted Mystic Magic Masquerade who I have worked with before, and he came up with these fantastic head pieces.
 

Corsets and Castles

 This location had been on my bucket list for a couple of years. 
We were warned off on our first attempt, but we succeeded the next day. Although no one was happy about meeting in the hotel lobby at 5am it was defiantly wort it. Thanks to James Kerwin for sharing the driving, Roswell Ivory and Jade Stacy Maria  for being ready at 5am so we could shoot in good light without getting busted. And Orchid Corsetry for providing Roswell's outfit.
I will post a set about the location soon. 
 

A little teaser for my post about the location.

Promo Shoot for Dhelly De Inferno & Adam Lightspeed.

I can't say much about this shoot yet,  but I was helping out my videographer buddy at Circle Line Studios UK on a project. I had to produce a set of promotional stills. 

Danielle May Sheehan. Part 1

I rarely do studio work, preferring location and events, but in December it's cold and miserable outside, so I took the opportunity to to do something different and spent an afternoon in Coco studio.  It’s a refreshing change to be shooting somewhere warm with no risk of being disturbed.
 I came away with a few ideas for a home studio, but more about that another time.
Danielle was a real pleasure to shoot, hopefully we will do something on location in the summer.

Death of British Industry

We went for a wander round a mothballed U.K. steel plant, due to cheap imports from overseas it is obvious it will never run again.  The site has changed hands many times , but went into administration on 25 January 2012 with the loss of 350 jobs.
 
The first photo in this post is a five shot vertical panorama,  five shots stitched together. the final coped image being 1.9gb with over fifty million pixels.
  

Chernobyl & Pripyat.

If you want to visit derelict places Chernobyl & Pripyat has to be one of the all time top locations. I visited in Apr 2015. I was intending to put it off until after buying a new camera, but with the war in Eastern Ukraine hotting up, I decided I should go while I still could. 
      50,000 people were evacuated, when reactor number four went into meltdown then blew up.  To speed up the evacuation, the residents were told to bring only what was necessary since the authorities said it would only be a temporary evacuation lasting approximately three days. As a result, the residents left most of their personal belongings which can still be found at Pripyat. An exclusion zone of 30 km (19 mi) remains in place today.

We met this couple who refused to leave, they still live within the exclusion zone.

The crew, from right to left. Myself, James Kerwin, Ritchie Gowin, Gigi Soden, 
Rebecca Bathory, Jess Norgrove,  Adam x should have been in this as well, but he was lagging behind as normal.

Lulu Lockhart, Table Light.

I prefer location work over shooting in a studio, but living in the United Kingdom the weather is pretty unreliable. So I have been trying to improve my studio skills. I was only intending to experiment with lighting when I shot these, but thanks to the very talented Lulu Lockhart, I ended up with these, which were later published in NIF magazine. 

Hellfire Nun

When I shot this it was the most technically complex shoot I had attempted to date.
I used five different light sources one huge reflector, and approximately twelve smoke canisters. After a lot of prep work all theses shots were taken in a two minute  window, that's how long we had good amounts of smoke for.  We had a little time left after the latex shoot, so we shot a quick second style as well.
  This was a personal protect, with a fantastic team of people supporting me.  Model: Elyssia. Make up: Iberian Black Arts. Latex: Dark Virtue Designs.