Jonathan Schofield takes a look at what's going on around the city
Place North West ask what’s the most important building of the last 100 years?
This is an interesting idea from Place North West. The magazine is asking people what is the most significant building in the last 100 years in Manchester in terms of ‘enhancing the city in its broadest sense’ and ‘moving it forward’. That's the last 100 years, so that timeframe does not include The Town Hall, The Royal Exchange, Manchester Cathedral, or John Rylands Library.
I'm pondering my choice, but leaning towards Central Library from 1934 in terms of what it symbolises. Think about all that citizen learning, instruction and amusement, plus the fact it is still working wonderfully well with over 1.5m visits annually.
As a less obvious choice and one that’s a cheat as it isn’t a building as such, I might vote for the Metrolink system, whatever its travails. Or maybe Manchester Airport, again whatever its travails.
It’s a shame the debate only covers the City of Manchester otherwise the winner would have to be The Trafford Centre because no other design in the last hundred years has contributed to so many migraines amongst architecture lovers.
Good pub discussion this one. Yet recently, very recently one building has pushed itself to the top of the list…
The one clear winner of Manchester’s most important building in the last 100 years
Heron House. This bland, anonymous, foil for the glorious Manchester Town Hall was designed, if that’s the right word, by Leach Rhodes Walker and finished in 1982. It was spruced up by 5plus Architects. It has now been visited by a significance totally beyond its aesthetic by becoming the number 10 of the North, the Friday seat of government, the first outside London in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Now that is important.
Dakota Hotel Airport
There’s a new luxury hotel at Manchester Airport, not the obvious place one might think. I went for a look. The £54m Dakota Hotel Airport from the Glasgow-based company has 154 bedrooms and suites. The interior, especially the restaurant and bar has that sultry sensual low-lit Art Deco ambience guests to the Manchester city centre Dakota will recognise. Very glam indeed, as sharp as a pin and as moody as a Jack Vettriano.
The interior designer is Amanda Rosa, the architects are KPP (Kilmartin Plowman & Partners) from West Yorkshire. Externally they have delivered an austere building that has the air of a modernist hotel in Budapest or Berlin from the twenties and the thirties.
In the days of huge international hotel chains and franchises the seven UK Dakotas are still family owned. There’s a good story behind this. Guests with long memories might be reminded by the Dakotas of the first hotels in the sultry Malmaison chain. This should come as no surprise. It was the late Ken McCullough who conceived the Malmaison hotels utilising the talents of Amanda Rosa, the aforementioned present Dakota designer. McCullough eventually sold the Malmaison chain, went off to Spain with his riches, got bored and came back, opening an improved version of the Malmaison just round the corner from the first ever and still functioning Malmaison in Glasgow. Admirable chutzpah
Matt Townley is one of Manchester’s most amiable hoteliers and he explained the rationale behind the airport hotel. He says: “It means guests can extend their holiday with a luxury experience before or after travelling.” But why at Manchester Airport? “The family love Manchester,” says Matt. “We won’t be opening another airport hotel anywhere. Just this one in Manchester.” Not sure such affection makes sense in the cut-throat world of business, but we’ll take it.
Save Jodrell Bank, it makes sense
Last week the organisation known as UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) said it was cutting costs. They were withdrawing funding for the e-Merlin network, the UK’s national radio astronomy facility at Jodrell Bank, in March 2028. It was a shock as Jodrell Bank still delivers valuable work. In a letter to the business secretary Jonathan Reynolds a whole roster of celebrities, scientific and showbusiness, have rallied to the cause as revealed in this BBC article. ‘We believe,’ they’ve written, ‘that to shut it down to save just £2.8m a year is foolish and shortsighted’.
Nobody it seems wants the incredible structure, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, to become simply a monument, a visitor attraction, a zombie radio telescope, despite its beautiful visitors centre. That it still does real work, that, in essence, it still breathes, adds immeasurably to every visit.
As one commentator pointed out, there are some campaigns that are doomed to failure, this one seems winnable. You can join the Manchester Evening News campaign here.
Everyone in the North West of England remembers their first encounter with Jodrell Bank. Mine was very distant. As a child from the moors above Rochdale Jodrell Bank was always there, a presence on the southern horizon, thirty miles away.
"Look lad," my dad said, "that right out there is Jodrell Bank. It was the first telescope in the world to spot the Russian satellite Sputnik."
Then, a little later, when I passed closer, the alien nature of the great Lovell telescope from 1957 was overwhelming. I remembered thinking this alien is looking for aliens. That role might be very secondary to its real function but that was what was in my head.
Wonderwall at the Proms
This was very jolly. More than 200 hundred professional musicians on stage from the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Symphony Chorus, and the BBC Singers to bash out the Oasis classic Wonderwall. Here’s the link.
Sadiq Khan doesn’t read the room
The day after the Prime Minister arrived for his first Number 10 of the North meeting on Friday 24 July I led a music tour. One of the guests was a gentleman from the government who had decided to come up to Manchester because, as he said: "I've never been to the north of England and since I work in government I thought this was a good time to familiarise myself with the place." He was probably in his forties, maybe late forties. “I know, it’s taken too long,” he said after I gave him a look.
He wouldn't give me his name which was a bit strange but he had some fine gossip. Apparently, some of the Metro mayors who had been due to meet that day with Andy Burnham were delayed by late trains. The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, was allegedly heard to say without irony but after a long sigh: "Obviously we should have held this in London." Somebody then apparently said something along the lines of him not reading the room.
Neon Mayor
Congratulations to Bev Craig of Labour who easily beat opponents in the Greater Manchester Mayoral election. To my mind, continuity of tenure and thus stability for Greater Manchester is the order of the day in these turbulent times.
On election night this large neon display on the Axis tower in Manchester made people smile. It looked very Soviet Union or Chinese Communist Party. It reminded me of something else too. Below is the photoshopped image Linda Moyo created for Manchester Confidential after we’d conducted an interview with former Council Leader Sir Richard Leese and then reused for this interview in 2021.
Hidden City Plaques – the body snatcher
It’s easy to pass city centre plaques without turning one’s head. Next time take a look at this one on Bridge Street, it has a wonderfully macabre story.
Joseph Jordan was born in Manchester in 1787. He studied in Burke and Hare country, aka Edinburgh, before returning to Manchester in 1812 and two years later opened the first provincial school of anatomy.
He needed, of course, fresh meat.
This is one of the official citations about the man and his school. ‘His ‘suppliers didn’t kill to provide bodies (like Burke and Hare), merely ‘obtained’ them. The charge was £10 per body. His supply was so good that he sold bodies to other surgeons, especially in Edinburgh where they were more difficult to obtain. He was fined by the magistrates and his resurrectionist was sent to prison. The magistrate said he was reluctant to punish Mr Jordan, for he understood the need for students of surgery to learn their trade on cadavers.
‘On one occasion the body of a man was completely dressed up and set up in carriage between two persons and driven homewards. Being stopped at a turnpike for the purposes of paying a toll, the drivers for a short time were in a great state of trepidation, for fear of being discovered with their ghastly charge, but they managed to escape without detection.’
By the way the address in Bridge Street was said to be haunted and Jordan had difficulties in retaining servants. He was a good-looking and kindly man with an infectious laugh but he never married, perhaps, as one story goes, because he slept on a camp bed in the property with spare bones stored beneath.
The plaque on Bridge Street needs touching up it’s definitely decomposing.
Mixed messages
Every week the Chief Executive of Manchester City Council (MCC), Tom Stannard, emails his staff to let them know what he's been doing over the previous seven days. His staff don’t send him an email telling them what they've been up to. I wonder if he’d be interested?
Meanwhile every Friday, as noted previously on this newsletter, MCC staff receive ‘Well-being tips’. This was a recent example: ‘Sharpen your knives.’ That was it. The timing seemed unfortunate a week before the mayoral election. It’s hard to understand why MCC bothers with this nonsense.
It was even more unfortunate that a few days later Mr Stannard revealed he'd attended and much admired the premiere of Lives Not Knives, a movie by young people from St Peter’s RC school in Longsight.
Get the latest news to your inbox
Get the latest food & drink news and exclusive offers by email by signing up to our mailing list. This is one of the ways that Confidentials remains free to our readers and by signing up you help support our high quality, impartial and knowledgable writers. Thank you!
Join our WhatsApp group
You can also get regular updates on news, exclusives and offers by joining the Manchester Confidential WhatsApp group.
