At one with One UK city centre living

I have always found that late September and early October are the times for a fresh start and new beginnings, much more so than January and the new calendar year.

This is probably due to September being the time of going back to school and college, something engrained within us all at an early age. So, soon we are socialised to see September as starting a clean slate.

Manchester city centre is now full with its 80,000 students, all needing accommodation and often moving to new places every academic year. But like any city, that’s just a small percentage of a vast urban population. Manchester has a constant turnover of people moving into, out of and around the region, all wanting somewhere desirable to live that fits in with their lifestyle.

Because of the housing market there are masses of properties to rent in the city centre. Likewise, some fortunate people are able to own city centre apartments and rent them out. Whichever side of the housing divide you are then One UK is a good place to start. You can rest assured that they offer a wide range of options for city centre living. Based in Leeds and Liverpool as well as Manchester they are experts in finding you a decent home to rent.

It may be a case of moving out to the suburbs or beyond to raise a family, young and old professionals moving into the city centre for the nightlife and culture, or people moving from other regions for a new career in a new town.

One UK even produce an excellent guide to the different areas in the city. This got me wondering and reminded me of the wonderful array of diverse housing opportunities there are in the city centre. You can live the high life in modern Spinningfields, as in my photo above, where you can overlook the ancient River Irwell on one side of the bustle office and retail life in Hardman Square on the other.

You can find the area guide here.

You may be more suited to a converted worker’s cottage, warehouses or former offices where you can live to the beat of the slightly boho Northern Quarter (photo below). The Green Quarter offers local amenities day and night. Galleries and shops, bars and a good local transport hub. as do Castlefield and the Southern Gateway.

Steel, glass and angularity await you in other areas across the city at both ends of Deansgate and beyond, or you may feel more at home in one of the many robust and characterful converted mills. Out east there’s rejuvenated Sports City and Ancoats, or a south westerly walk to an equally revamped Hulme. Over to the west there is a buzz in parts of Salford, and not just at Media City.

For more tips on Manchester living and apartments, visit the One UK website.

ABC Wednesday: "J" is for Junk on Dale Street

Here we are at "J" day and I was toying with the idea of featuring two Mancheser giants (or is that jiants?) not yet featured here on Mancunian Wave - the Jodrell Bank Observatory or John Rylands Library.

But I'll save those for another time and go for Junk, a cool place, voted best independent shop in Manchester. It is truly wonderful and inspiring to find somewhere that truly embraces a sustainable ethos and is example to all retailers everywhere.

I love their description of their being "Industrial Hippies in a concrete jungle" who  "apply green ethics to our retail manifesto and infuse enjoyment to the consumer experience."

They opened in 2005 and their shop "has been lovingly furnished entirely from reusable materials (first discarded then reclaimed) given new life in a consciously sustainable environment."

What do they sell? Sustainable fashion made in Manchester is their strapline and they stock a range of interesting clothes and accessories with a vintage twist so get along to 2 Dale Street or visit them at www.junkshopuk.com .

Linked to ABC Wednesday .

Bright day

Passers by at one of the city centre apartment blocks. We'll be looking at one Manchester Letting Agency later this week. 

Taking part today in the Ruby Tuesday blog.

Monday murals always rising...

The monthly billboard space at Print and Paste currently merges Manchester with Barrow-in-Furness. The busy bee (as every Mancunian and many regular readers of Mancunian Wave may also know) being the symbol of Manchester. A ram represents Barrow. Jeffrey Bowman (Mr Bowlegs) and Daren Newman (Me&MyPen) are the artists and “Always rising by wisdom and effort” seems a decent enough adage to kickstart any week.

Linked to Monday Murals at the Oakland Daily Photo blog

To read more about the artists who created the above piece here's a couple of links:
www.meandmypen.com and www.jeffrey-bowman.co.uk .

A multi-specied tree

An inventive use of a dead tree at Stamford Park in Altrincham.

Weekend Reflections: Pop Boutique

Cafe Pop opened here well over 20 years ago, selling wonderful vintage vinyl, clothes, crockery and plastic household items, from magazine racks and fruit bowls to hat stands and formica tables. The veggie cafe was a great place to eat too. 

An aspect of Cafe Pop that remains to this day is Pop Boutique which set up here in 1994, as does its location on Oldham Street.

Over many a long lunch here I co-wrote the weekly Relax with the Grim Reaper and MeMeMe (Polyp & Brand) cartoon strips with cartoonist Polyp back in the 1990s.

More Weekend Reflections.

Skywatch Fridays: Beetham tilt

Part of the MOSI (Museum of Science & Industry) on the left and the Beetham Tower: very different purposes, built in different centuries, but neighbours with their own individual style. Looking eastwards at sunset on Liverpool Road.

See what other bloggers around the globe have seen in the sky this week, at Skywatch Friday .

Rural Thursday: Amaizing -shades of green

The maize fields on a walk between Hare Hill and Alderley Edge in northern Cheshire this week. I previously posted a photo of the same field in July last year.

Personally I am pleased to learn that in recent years some local farmers have decided to grow maize in place of the more usual Cheshire dairy cash crops: cream, cattle and of course, Cheshire cheese, the oldest cheese in England.

Mancunian Wave is linking today to the Rural Thursday blog.

ABC Wednesday: I is for Imli, ambience under the tamarind tree

Imli is a favourite Indian restaurant of mine, located on Deansgate and with stylish surroundings that the food always matches. It's part of the Lal Qila Restaurant Group with signature Karahi dishes served in a small copper pot. "Imli" is an Urdu word for tamarind, a tree which produces the seed pods used in cooking.

I agree, to a point, with the marketing which states "The atmosphere at Imli is chic, yet the signature sizzling platters create an ambiance [sic] which is authentic, lively and modern. The interior setting is enhanced by the modern Indo-ambiant [sic] music especially selected by world wide acclaimed DJ, Jermaine Dalrymple." He's a local R&B artist and a DJ on the Manchester club scene and beyond.  Linked to ABC Wednesday.

Che Guevara & the flying saucer

Flights of fancy has been the theme for the 2012 Tatton Biennial, which runs until 30th September.  You'd best fly off to Tatton Park in the remaining three weeks to see it all for yourself: www.tattonparkbiennial.org

This photo is of Dinu Lu's crashed flying saucer which on the inside contains "a sequence of video communications from the Marxist hero Che Guevara, who exists in at least three parallel universes, relate the nature of his crash landing as well as his evolving ideas about the virtues of space flight and dub music as the most effective revolutionary forces at work in the world today." You can see a short extract here: https://vimeo.com/41849720 .

Pretty intriquing. And is that the sky or a stream of smoke emanating from the rearside of the UFO? ;-)

The back half of an aeroplane with a mural of one of the famous deer of Tatton is another exhibit (Gleaners of the Infocalypse by the Juneau Project).

The Biennial blurb reflects that "This third edition of the Biennial considers the human urge to fly, to accomplish the impossible in fragile times. Its artists are exploring the impact of experimentation on delicate eco-systems, looking backward and forward for guidance, wisdom and/or humour. Their resulting works are experiments in time and space."  Wonderful video of the Tatton 2012 Biennial .

Linking with the Ruby Tuesday blog.