Following the tragic death of Liam Payne on Wednesday, fans around the world are coming together to hold vigils in his memory. While a memorial has already been held in his hometown of Wolverhampton and another in Liverpool, further gatherings are planned on Sunday in London, Manchester, and Birmingham. Fans have also come together in Sydney, Manila, and elsewhere to pay their respects.
The One Direction star, who was 31, died after falling from the third floor of a hotel balcony in Argentina. It is not yet known when his body will be repatriated to the UK. Fans have been encouraged to bring letters, flowers, and messages to the memorials being held around the world.
In Liverpool, a group of Directioners gathered at the Keel Warf Bridge at Royal Albert Dock on Saturday. They left photographs of Payne, flowers, teddy bears, and balloons at the bridge, and sang One Direction songs. People also came together in Wolverhampton, where the singer was born in 1993. Around 100 people looked down with their heads bowed as flowers were laid outside St Peter’s Church.
Vigils have been held outside the Casa Sur hotel in Buenos Aires, where Payne was found dead, and in Sydney fans congregated with one called Amber telling the Reuters news agency about the sense of loss she was feeling. On Sunday afternoon, a vigil is taking place in London’s Hyde Park. Organiser Alicia Sinclair, 22, from Hertfordshire, said One Direction was “a light in a lot of people’s lives, especially mine.”
Payne rose to global fame as part of the boyband One Direction, created on The X Factor TV show in 2010. The band sang together with bandmates Harry Styles, Louis Tomlinson, Zayn Malik, and Niall Horan. Malik left the group in 2015 to embark on a solo singing career, and the band later split in 2016. Malik announced on Saturday he had postponed the US leg of his upcoming tour after the “heartbreaking loss” of his former bandmate
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