Yorkshire Women Breaking Barriers: A Legacy of Progress
As we mark International Women’s Day 2025, we embrace this year’s powerful theme: Accelerate Action. A celebration and a reminder to break barriers, push forward, and demand the progress that women everywhere deserve.
Female entrepreneurs in Leeds are transforming industries and motivating future generations to dream bigger. The Lifted Project exemplifies Yorkshire’s commitment to empowering women in business, providing mentorship and resources to high-growth female innovators.
Zandra Moore, CEO of Panintelligence and chair of the Leeds Regional Growth Board, is a persistent advocate of female equality in entrepreneurship.
She emphasises the ‘double disadvantage’ that female founders outside of London confront and is working to guarantee that Yorkshire women have equal access to financing, opportunities, and success.
Anna Jones and Debbie Wosskow co-founded AllBright, an organisation and community dedicated to supporting and uplifting female entrepreneurs, to offer women the funding, mentorship, and networking they need to grow their businesses.
From locally-owned cafes and shops to large-scale businesses and women-led organisations, all are contributing to a more inclusive and dynamic local economy.
Businesses like Laynes Espresso, owned by women who are passionate about quality coffee and community, The Bowery, a women-led art gallery and café supporting local creatives, and Fabrication, a female-founded collective for independent makers, show the incredible impact of women in business.
Women in Leeds have always fought for progress, and their legacy continues to affect the city today.
Leonora Cohen, a suffragette, took a stand for voting rights by smashing a glass case at the Tower of London in 1913.
Gertrude Paul, Leeds’ first black headteacher, dedicated her life to empowering students and promoting diversity, and Nicola Adams, the Leeds-born boxing champion, became the first woman to win an Olympic gold medal in boxing, breaking down gender barriers in sports.