Manchester

Bamber’s Art Space/ Koffee Pot

Hilton Street

Take one former sewing machine shop and a Manchester artist famous for his mosaics. Add a liberal dose of quirky furniture. Season with one-off gigs, exhibitions and musical friends. And there you have it: Bamber’s Art Space, one of the city’s most eclectic cultural experiences.

Bamber’s is the brainchild of artist Mark Kennedy and furniture designers Lorna Lucas and Danny Healey, who took over the vacant sewing shop in 2006. It’s slap bang in the centre of the Northern Quarter, and is the perfect location for Kennedy to show off his work (he’s also spent a decade constructing the tiled artworks that adorn Afflecks Palace, just round the corner). And Bamber’s huge windows make it the ideal shop window for Lucas and Healey’s mix of new, salvaged and mid 20th-century furniture.

But Bamber’s is not simply a vanity project. It puts on events, performances and art shows. The Fall’s frontman Mark E Smith is a patron – the band sometimes rehearse in the basement and Bamber’s hosts occasional exhibitions of their artwork. Papier-mâché-headed comedian Frank Sidebottom has shown paintings here, while the organisers of Viva La Muralists chose Bamber’s to debut a new street art festival in 2006. Bamber’s also has a ‘performance window’ – a glass-sided room fronting on to the street that’s a favourite for fashion photographers.

What makes Bamber’s interesting is its unpredictability – you can never be sure what you might find. Entirely self-funded, Kennedy and friends are free to do what they like and are always open to new ideas. When the Koffee Pot café next door was due to close, for example, Bamber’s decided to rescue it, transforming it with a mosaic sign, lashings of street art and a new menu. So if you don’t find what you’re looking for at Bamber’s, you can always pop next door for a consolatory bacon buttie.

• Did you find this useful? Yes No
•