Manchester Northern Quarter

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Members of the band, seventies vinyl and a walrus. Does it get any cooler than this?

Now I could be wrong but was that Noel Gallagher I just saw mooching into Vinyl Exchange or Eastern Bloc or That Beatin’ Rhythm or any of the vintage music and clothes meccas in Manchester? Could have been, as everyone in Manchester is in a band who are going to be the next big thing. The small matter of the Beatles aside, Manchester reckons that, from The Hollies to The Smiths to New Order to Oasis, they are the cocks of the North. The vibrant indie scene here is throwing up more bands than you could fit in the O2 arena (wherever that is). And all these icily cool trend setters and their fans have to shop somewhere. So where?

In the smart new Harvey Nicks or the achingly stylish boutiques of King Street? No, you’ll find them in the Northern Quarter. The Northern Quarter is actually in the heart of the city, but somehow miraculously escaped the zeal of the town-planners and managed to survive with its old eccentric little street grid intact. You know that line ‘build it and they will come’? Well the Northern Quarter experienced the opposite. Nobody wanted to develop it. So, perversely, people came. Creative people who wanted to be in town but without shelling out the rent in the more chi-chi addresses. Galleries, ditto. And, amazingly, the odd deli. Or to put it another way, an amazing deli. (You’ll have to find it for yourself).

What isn’t a secret is Afflecks, which is the hub of the Northern Quarter; for generations they have come to Afflecks: part Aladdins cave, part cultural icon that attracts shoppers from across the Northwest. Inside, there’s floor after floor with warrens of stalls, cubby holes and counters offering not only clothes but tattooing, hairstyling, jewellery and ceramics. It’s a must-visit destination for retro fashionistas. In fact one stall was displaying what bore an uncanny resemblance to the entire contents of my seventies wardrobe. Mentioning this to the guy operating the till, who turned out to be the owner, he laughed and said you could get anything you want at Afflecks. It’s a bit of a launch pad for fledgling designers to try out ideas and for the more adventurous souls to find experimental fashion. Without, it has to be said, the pretentious price tags.