SUMMER IN THE CITY
Manchester never stops, and summer is the best time to explore the city on
foot, to absorb the energy and architecture of this pround Victorian city.
And the streets are alive this summer with festivals of arts, music,
theatre, food and drink. Here's a run-down of some of the biggest and best
events, with a complete list at Visit
Manchester
August sees the 10th anniversary of the legendary D.
Percussion, the biggest free music festival in the North of England.
Also on in August is the award-winning 24:7
Theatre Festival featuring newly-written, one-hour plays in unusual
non-theatre venues. Or catch Platform
4 Piccadilly , a new festival of outdoor performances twith a mix of
dance, circus, theatre and music. Summer’s climax is Manchester
Pride, a world-famous 10-day spectacle over August bank holiday.
Autumn kicks off with the annual Manchester
Food and Drink Festival in October. Food lovers can enjoy the atmosphere
on St Ann’s Square and Albert Square with restaurants, chefs, local
producers and farmers celebrating regional produce. Follow this up with some
brain food at the Manchester
Literature Festival and the annual Manchester
Comedy Festival.
Manchester is a great city for hanging out, wandering around and seeing and
being seen, all against a backdrop of new and restored buildings testifying
to the city's extraordinary renaissance over the past decade. Here are our
favourite things about Manchester but we'd like to hear your favourite
summer-in-the-city tips. Enter our summer
in the city competition , tell us how you like to spend a day in
your favourite city and you could win a weekend in London.
1. It has been a good summer for Manchester, just one long party. The city has
just enjoyed the inaugural Manchester
International Festival and, to the relief of the organisers, the
majority of the critics up from London declared it a success.
Ordinary Mancunians joined the clamour for tickets to see Chen Shi-Zheng's
Monkey: Journey to the West and pay homage to Damon Albarn's score. They
also greeted the two peeing lady acrobats and bull with a walk-on part in
the controversial visual art work Il Tempo del Postino with some aplomb.
2. Carlos Acosta, Lou Reed, The Fall and others may have moved on but the
party goes on. Last week, those who mourn the demise of the Hacienda
night club, home of the Madchester pop phenomenon, were queueing at Urbis,
the spectacular glass museum, for the launch party of an exhibition to
celebrate 25 years since it opened its doors.
3. This week all you need to do is wander out onto the streets to hear the
distant strains of another party taking up the slack. Follow the John
Thomson-lookalikes to the Manchester
Jazz Festival where you can listen to some alto sax against the soapy
stone backdrop of St Anne's Church....nice. Nobody around here requires much
excuse to erect an Alpine village outside the town hall and start knocking
back foaming plastic beakers of beer.
As Frank Gallagher, the lager-drinking, chain-smoking godfather of Shameless,
might say: "We know how to throw a good party". There are only two
other things you need to know about Mancs - you cannot keep them down for
long and they call trousers '"kex"..
4.The city may have lost the supercasino but, hey, we have gained Sven-Goran
Erikkson, the newly-installed Manchester city coach. At Bernard Manning's
funeral - a very Manchester scene - the paparazzi gathered at Blackley
Crematorium chatted happily about the potentially profitable prospect of
chasing the Swede and his girlfriend Nancy dell'Olio around town.
5.The city is looking good. More than a decade after the IRA blew a hole in
the centre of the city's retail district, the rebuilding and recasting of
the city centre is complete. A quarter which includes the Manchester
Cathedral once dislocated from the city by the unlovely Arndale has been
restored. On one side of Exchange
Square shoppers emerging from Selfridge's pass Harvey Nichols, Burberry,
Louis Vuitton, Heal's, Reiss, and a Ted Baker all within a hundred yards.
As a southerner originally who has been working and living in Manchester for 8 years I can safely say I am very proud of the way the city has developed over the last few years. It has a very varied nightlife in a fairly compact centre, some great restaraunts and an excellent live music scene.
Some places are pretentious and some grotty but most are trendy with a laid back vibe.
I have met many foreigners who have lived both in London and Manchester and all prefer this fine Northern City.
Jon, Manchester,
I went to Manchester last night, the first day of "Pride", I'd never been for a night out in Manchester before. I won't be going again. It was closed! The pubs were closed at 11pm in the main and it was almost impossible to get food after 8pm, unless of course your idea of dinner out is Burger King, who tried to shortchange me by the way. I'm a 50 year old single professional, home owning male witha pension plan. If I was 20 and all I wanted to do was drink my way round town on a empty stomach, Manchester would be the place to be !!!
Now I know why teen drinking is in the news so much, that's all there is to do.
Paul, Shrewsbury, England
Bah, this is just hype.
Recent development has only made this grim place comparable to other major cities. It is astonishing - but far too late, and still not enough.
And no one mentions the neighbouring part of the city on a radius of half about a mile, much of which is a grim ASBO wasteland of chavs and undesirables. In fact % wise, that's mostly what this grim grey-sky place is.
Yes Dudley Rd is in Whalley Range. A place where drug addicts and alkies stroll the streets, next to Moss side where's recently been more gun play.
Stay in Lancaster starling - that's a nice place!!
Joe, Manchester,
We have a lot to offer, but we need to be honest to potential visitors - London we aint, and to be honest lots of the city centre doesn't yet have the quality we need. But grit and grime are cool now - and for a former mill town with more than average rainfall we have a lot to show off. We are up there with Birmingham and Liverpool as a great weekend destination, but they seem to be more geared up to tourists - so come on everybody, come and visit us, and if it rains you can get umbrellas for £1 in the pound shops!
Deborah Leonard, Manchester, England
Don't forget to drop in for an Abduls Chicken Naan too!
Simon Jones, Rusholme, UK
Manchester certainly has reinvented itself and there is no doubt the city is on the up and up.The shopping,entertainment and sporting scene is hard to beat.Most new visitors are surprised on the wide range of architecture as its much better than they were expecting.I recommend anyone who hasn't been to make a visit and I'm sure they will be back.
Chapman, Cheshire, England
For me I have never been in Britain but I think all manchester is woundeful place to visit .
" in my big dreams"
salem, hail, saudi arabia
As a child I used to live on Dudley Road (#124) and remember the heavenly aroma of the rain-soaked privet hedges on nearby streets after a shower of rain, walking back with my Mum, from nearby shops.
Is Dudley Road in the Whalley Range district ?
I wish someone would send me a photograph of #124, for my family history !
Keep on rockin' and chompin' , Manchester !
C. Martin
Christian Martin, Lake Mary , Florida USA 32746
Don't forget your brolly.
I quite like Manchester, you mentioned some places I hadn't found before, thanks!
starling, Lancaster,