Manchester

Portico Library & Gallery

57 Mosley Street, entrance on Charlotte Street

Tucked unobtrusively away at the side of the Bank pub, and accessed via a buzzer system, the Portico recently celebrated 200 cerebral years of book lending and arts events. Its tightly-packed library, with creaking floorboards, leather-backed chairs and archaic section headings (‘polite literature’ is one), takes you right back to 19th-century Manchester (but you have to be a member to borrow from the collection). A changing series of art exhibitions take place in the gallery housed beneath a gorgeous Georgian glass dome ceiling, and literary events are held throughout the year.

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