Which UK city is the most creative? Manchester?

Manchester was a new city. The first industrialised one in the world. And it still feels new to me. OK, there are shabby bits, dirty nooks and crannies, our offices in one of them, but being new, making stuff and pushing things on is in the city’s DNA.

This is the city where I grew up, and it’s where I came back to when I joined Tucker Clarke-Williams and then LOVE. It’s also where we chose to set up Music. So, this city has always been the ‘centre of the creative universe’ for me. But I’m not alone. People come here and stay. Whatever it was that brought them here in the first place (for study, for family, for work or for the hell of it) there’s a sense of being part of a place that keeps them here. It’s a city that seems to matter, without trying too hard.

I appreciate some people might prefer a prettier city with graceful geographical features. And that’s all well and good, but if you’re drawn to a bit of buzz, and an edge and an energy, then Manchester will have you any day of the week. Sure we had the Hacienda, and the bands, and the nineties. But to look backwards at any city’s cultural heritage and label it creative in the present tense feels like cheating. Consider instead Manchester International Festival and the enormous amount of energy and publicity it generated for the city this summer by hosting premieres by Rufus Wainwright, Mercury Award winning local lads Elbow and the reclusive kings of electronica Kraftwerk.

It’s also hard not to feel slightly flattered that the BBC choose Salford Quays as its North West home.

Also worth a mention is the quality of educational establishments in the city such as the University of Manchester and the Royal Northern College of Music. These help keep the talent pool well stocked, which in turn fuels further innovation.

In short Manchester is a city that’s always had to earn its living. It’s always had to create, to make something that wasn’t there before, and it achieves this without pretension. To those of us lucky enough to work here I think it’s about being honest, keeping your head down, defying the naysayers and just getting on with the business of being different.

(Photo courtesy of a2o, Flickr)

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