Built by Sound

Mixed Reality

Installation

Format

Mixed Reality

Year

2025

Runtime

60min

Producer

No Ghost, Dialled In

Co-Producer

Bradford 2025 City of Culture

Official Website

A mixed reality installation where memory moves to a beat.

Built by Sound is an immersive MR exploration of British South Asian communities in the 1970s and ’80s finding joy in defiance, community and music – from the thump of dhol drums in parish halls to pirate radio buzzing through walls.

Stories of the past. Technology of the future.

Created by No Ghost and Dialled In with Bradford 2025, this interactive exhibition built from archival footage, personal testimonies and spatialised rhythms, recreates a momentous era for South Asian communities in the UK – and particularly in Bradford.

Built By Sound takes us back to a time when young South Asians carved out new space in society, soundtracked their resistance against oppression, and stood up to the fascist rhetoric of the National Front – not in silence but in celebration.

Blending the physical and digital

Commissioned to celebrate the culmination of Bradford 25: City of Culture and funded by the BFI, Built By Sound expands the horizons of multi-user attractions. Designed to be highly accessible, BBS blurs the lines between physical and digital, past and present. An experiential documentary that’s built to be shared.

A mixed reality installation where memory moves to a beat.

Scripted by Nikesh Shukla and directed by Shehani Fernando, Built by Sound is a tribute to the power of collective memory as a force against racism and erasure. For anyone who’s ever felt unheard – and turned the volume up anyway. Whether you lived it, or it’s the first time you’re hearing it – this is your invitation in. A story of resistance through a rhythm that feels close, urgent, and alive.