When The New York Times It recently selected Manchester as one of 52 places to visit in 2024, alongside Paris, Singapore and Florida, highlighting the music that has “long been at the heart of Manchester’s gritty soul” and the new Co-op Live indoor arena, opened in April. “Stars including Liam Gallagher, Eric Clapton and Barry Manilow have been booked to inaugurate the 23,500-capacity venue,” writes Nora Walsh.
You could argue that the core of the city’s gritty soul comes from two hundred years of industrial development and that music has primarily been an escape, both for the artists and for the giggoers. Anyway, two of those artists have nothing to do with Manchester, nor its guts: Barry Manilow! – and Liam Gallagher, 51, is definitely yesterday’s rock star rebel.
But of course The New York Times targets its wealthy readers. Many will have been to London, where they were served plenty of heritage, along with overpriced fish and chips, parading horse guards, posh theaters and a generous choice of TGI Fridays, McDonald’s and Five Guys branches. If that seems overly generalized and narrow-minded, I refer readers to the 2018 article in The New York Times entitled “Beyond Porridge and Boiled Mutton: A Taste of London”. Even supposedly civilized American journalists are not yet fully aware of Britain’s international culinary makeover – even though it began almost a century ago.
Mutual misunderstandings on the one hand: What can Americans expect to see and do in Manchester that they will find delightful and different from what they can get elsewhere?
One of the city’s best museums hosts an exhibition with poignant links to the United States. The Science and Industry Museum has a floor dedicated to the machines and manufacturers of Cottonopolis. Working looms and spinning jennies create an evocative din as guides talk about the industry’s ties to slavery and the US South.
When it comes to Britain’s industrial history – which is taught in American high schools – Manchester is strong on all fronts. Close to the museum is what used to be the terminus of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, the world’s first intercity line. Around the corner is the Midland Hotel, where Charles Rolls met Henry Royce in 1904 to talk cars – probably (there is no written evidence). The glorious neo-Gothic Town Hall is home to coats of arms and mosaics featuring Manchester’s proud symbol: the worker bee. Americans, who are said to be workaholics based on their scarce vacation leave, will no doubt appreciate the symbol – although opponents claim it refers to the drone aspect of factory work.
Also nearby is the site where the Peterloo Massacre took place. Where there’s junk, there’s copper, but there are also unions, protests and communism. A statue of Manchester’s most famous 19ecentury left winger, Friedrich Engels, sits on a square named after the most famous 20ecentury entrepreneur, Tony Wilson Place. The founder of Factory Records, honored in his mansion, will only be known to a small music-loving intelligentsia from the US.
The most popular pilgrimage site for most Americans is the statue of Abraham Lincoln near Albert Square; As the plinth explains, the statue commemorates “the support given by the working people of Manchester in their struggle for the abolition of slavery during the American Civil War.” Liverpool, on the other hand, was the site of the last surrender of the American Civil War and is mentioned Gone with the wind – and attracts Southern-sympathizing tourists.
According to VisitBritain, there were 4.6 million visits from the US to Britain 2022. The top five cities were London (three million visits), Edinburgh (386,000 visits), Glasgow (136,000 visits), Manchester (111,000 visits) and Oxford (90,000 visits).
Patricia Yates, CEO of VisitBritain, said: “Britain is the most popular European destination for US visitors and the US is our largest and most valuable visitor market. American visitors are extremely important to our tourism industry and to our economy. We predict that American visitors will spend a record £6.3 billion in Britain this year. This means that almost £1 in every £5 spent by foreign visitors in Britain is by Americans.”
If Manchester’s industrial past succeeds as an edifying alternative to the splendor of the capital, can the North West’s biggest city compete on the other holiday essentials: food, drink, fun and games? Manchester-born Adam Reid, the head chef at The French at The Midland Hotel, says this isn’t necessary.
“The entire British economy has been focused on blowing up London for hundreds of years, making it a cultural melting pot with a 24/7 lifestyle and a population with disposable income and a preference for eating out. Manchester can’t match London, but why would it want to? We do what we do here and we don’t have to emulate anyone or compete with anyone. Manchester will lead the way by being Manchester as it has always been.”
Reid cooks for fine dining, but advises Americans to go ultra-local. “Don’t visit or leave without trying Bury black pudding (ideally cooked fresh from the market), cheese and onion pie with mushy peas, a home-made potato cake with crusty bread and butter, or if you’re here in February, forced Yorkshire rhubarb and custard.
“Every region in the world has its own food culture, terroir if you will, and all you need is a little knowledge and understanding of it and a desire to tell its story. Pies, casseroles, pies and offal are easy to take to the next level if you know what you’re doing and use quality products.”
If all else fails, the Facebook page ‘Americans in Manchester (Yankunians)’ is full of advice on scoring sky-high burgers and how to bargain for a Wetherspoons.
Manchester is changing quickly. Ask any Liverpudlian and they will point out – enviously – that the skyscrapers of “Manchattan” reflect a thriving local economy. In October 2023, Factory International, the flagship performing and visual arts space, opened – Britain’s largest investment in a national cultural project since Tate Modern. The international food scene is flourishing. New hotels are opening all the time. Hollywood films love the city as a location (Captain America was shot on Dale Street). New music, wine and LGBTQ routes have been mapped out throughout the city. A visitor pass has just been launched.
Nick Brooks-Sykes, tourism director at Manchester Marketing, said: “It’s a really good time to visit Manchester, with lots of new things to do and discover, but as always we recommend that any international visitor consider Manchester as their gateway. customs in the north of England; to explore the city and perhaps some of the emerging boroughs and neighborhoods in and around Greater Manchester, and then check out some of the other fantastic destinations on our doorstep across the North.”
With direct flights from New York’s JFK, Atlanta and Las Vegas, Americans can bypass London and spend more time in places like RHS Bridgewater, Jodrell Bank, Salford and Macclesfield.
As for new music, any American visiting Manchester this year will find performances every night of the week in pubs, small venues and medium-sized concert halls like Band on the Wall and New Century – both of which are set to reopen in 2022.
In The New York Times Walsh, defending Manchester songsmiths, splits “from Joy Division and the Stone Roses to Oasis and now Harry Styles”. It’s easy to be nosy, but she’s probably on the right track. Joy Division ended with the suicide of Ian Curtis in 1980. ‘Madchester’ was virtually over by 1990. Harry Styles, raised in the leafy Holmes Chapel and raised not at Factory Records but on X Factor, is more representative of modern Manchester than any legendary miserabilist. He’s also huge in America.