A push to uncover 2,017 “Dundee secrets” to impress the UK City of Culture competition judges has passed the halfway mark.
“Secrets” on the wedundee.com website, launched by the city’s arts and design group Fleet Collective, include family-run independent coffee shops, cultural diversity and the “village community”.
Other secrets posted point to Dundee’s arts community while others highlight its thriving games industry, it past and its internationalism.
Dundee is up against 10 competitors to be named UK City of Culture 2017 and it is hoped the 2,017 contributions of visitors and Dundonians past and present will push the decision in Dundee’s favour.
Jude Stewart’s secret carried the campaign over the halfway line.
“I grew up in and around Dundee,” the student and personal eco-shopper said.
“I started off in Mill o’ Mains. My house is now flattened. I was also brought up by my granny in Charleston, two doors away from the old Lord Provost John Letford. We moved to the Perth Road area in the 1970s.”
Jude, 42, said she always felt Dundee was a very creative place to live and signed herself up for a range of classes at the Dudhope Art Centre when she was a teenager.
“I did art and clay work, dance and drama,” she said.
“I was also one of the first people to get involved with the Dundee Rep youth drama. I took part in the summer workshop for children.”
Jude had to leave the city when she was 15 when her mum remarried, so missed out on Dundee’s club and pub scene but nearly 30 years on she still has a yearning for her hometown.
“I’m just homesick all the time,” she said.
“My relationship with Dundee has been quite bittersweet. I thought I would grow up there and go to art school there.”
Now based in Glasgow, she is “very excited” about Dundee’s future.
“I was down at the V&A in London recently and I can’t believe we’re getting it in Dundee,” she said.