DO you have an object that is special to you? It might be your grandad’s old watch, or your first record.

People across the Bradford district are invited to contribute a photograph of an item that means a lot to them, from domestic items to quirky keepsakes - things that remind them of a time, a place, a person or occasion - for an online museum, Bradford Revealed, launching in July.

Shipley-based 509 Arts is working with Bradford Museums and Galleries and Bradford 2025 on the project, and has created a website showcasing personal objects and stories that collectively celebrate the district. 509 Arts is seeking contributions from people of all ages and backgrounds to build up the collection.

Director Alan Dix said: “Bradford Revealed is a chance to share your special object with the world. This may be a letter, a gemstone, a battered teddy bear, a Valentine card. It might be sat on your mantelpiece or tucked away in a drawer. A precious object doesn’t have to be old or valuable, it just has to be important to you. Take a photo, write a few words about it and send it to us.”

Items shared so bar include a cat blackboard, from someone who returned to the district after several years: “My family wrote this message on the blackboard I brought with me. ‘Welcome home...Shipley loves you!’ I’ve never been able to rub that message off...I now feel superstitious about it and am terrified it might get erased!”

A photo of a piano came from someone who’d it since the age of seven: “It’s been in our family ever since. It was made in Bradford by Joshua Marshall in the late Victorian period and still sounds fantastic - I love thinking about all the Bradford people who’ve played it over the years.”

Other items include a small music box - “It cost a few pence but is precious because of its song; Somewhere Over the Rainbow. My mother sang it to generations of children in our family for about 65 years. It was the song we played at her funeral. When she was in her 80s she admitted she’d never watched The Wizard of Oz all the way through” - and one of 12 bracelets that belonged to a grandmother who lived in Kashmir: “Each one of her daughters and granddaughters has this bracelet. I wear mine every day.”

The stories will form part of Bradford’s bid to be City of Culture 2025. Bid director Richard Shaw said stories behind the objects tell of people’s experiences of the district: “These stories help to paint an authentic portrait of the district and people’s lives here. That’s what this bid is all about.”

* Email photos and stories to hello@bradfordrevealed.org. Visit bradfordrevealed.org