Barbra Streisand moves to Islington wharf?

My Dad Found This In A Dumpster

Ok the title is misleading, Barbra Streisand is not moving to Islington Wharf. But I bet if you lived here, you might not be so surprised, heck the chances are you might be excited! Maybe if I changed to another gay icon like Nick Frost, I might have you convinced?

Its Manchester Pride this bank holiday and its amazing to see how large a venture its turned into. I was seeing reports on Twitter that one of the events was warehouse project styled. For those outside of Manchester, the warehouse project is…

The Warehouse Project is a series of club nights organised in Greater Manchester, England, since 2006. It runs from September through to New Years Day each year plus occasional one off dates such as Bank Holiday weekends. It began operations in the disused Boddingtons Brewery in Strangeways, and then moved into a space under Manchester Piccadilly railway station, which previously served as an air raid shelter

The key point is Pride is massive and I was talking to Jane yesterday. I estimated 40% of islington Wharf might be gay… However Vivid Lounge’s Sam, suggested to me that I might be in the minority. In other words there may be a lot less straight people that I think living at Islington Wharf.

So what is it about islington wharf/new islington/northern quarter which seems to attract gay men and women? Me and Jane were talking about this yesterday too. Could it be one of these?

  1. Is it the proximity to Canal Street (Manchester’s famous gay village)?
  2. Is it being close to Piccadilly train station?
  3. Is it the flat prices?
  4. Is it the 5% deposit scheme?
  5. Is it that islington wharf is gay friendly generally?

Sam thinks its a chicken and egg problem, but the proximity to the village (canal street) is great for gay people. I don’t personally think its that close but considering other areas, like castlefield, green quarter, spinning fields, etc he might have a valid point. The proximity to Piccadilly station is attractive for everyone including myself. I can go from door to train in less than 15mins walking.

Sam suggests maybe lots of gay people working away from Manchester and this would be high on the list maybe? I do know a few people who work in London 3 days a week and yes they are gay.

The price of the flats and the deposit scheme might work hand in hand. Saving up 5% deposit for a flat is great news and to be fair if your buying it alone this can be done. Usually saving a deposit of 10% is a struggle and only a couple can do it maybe? (before you scream at me in the comments yes I know lots of gay couples but generally I would say most gay people in Islington Wharf are single, judging by the shocking amount of men on Grindr – that I’ve been shown!)

The chicken and egg problem Sam suggested might come into play with the last one. How do you make it gay friendly? I would suggest Islington wharf is full of modern thinking/liberal people who don’t have a problem with gay people in society. I remember one guy who was gay himself, who seemed a little shocked that I was so accepting of gay culture (he assumed I might have a slight problem). I think he expected me to be upset about it or something?

If anyone works out the answer to the question, they will be very wealthy (and of course rich which would be a shame)

What ever the reason, there are some interesting studies about the difference a Gay community can do. I’m just happy to be living in a place full of interesting liberal minded people… Starbucks and Pizza Express (meant to be the sign of a up and coming area right?) do not have a patch on the rainbow flags and consistent looking at mobiles screens of the gay community. Funny enough, Umair Haque said something which is very fitting

Never bet against love. It’s the only force that has ever truly changed the world…

What a difference a year makes… Vivid LoungeUK

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Fran of Vivid Lounge UK welcomes you with that warm smile, while Sam hides in the Kitchen (maybe to keep his head from exploding)

Over a year ago I wrote a blog post which made me one of the most hated people in my apartment block (islington wharf). It wasn’t deliberately made to piss anyone off but I guess no one wants to hear the truth, specially when things are on the line. Some said I was in-sensitive and my timing was very bad. No matter what they think, I wrote a number of points which I suggested could be to blame for the rapid shutdown of Vivid Lounge.

  1. Engagement with the residents and residents committee…
  2. Get Decor
  3. Environmental factors
  4. Taking feedback on the chin
  5. Celebrate every moment
  6. Its not just about us…
  7. Whats on the menu?

Each one I backed up with some of my own thoughts….

Anyway over the last year or so, I’ve witnessed a place go from closed to busy and delightful.

So what happened? Well frankly they did most of the things I suggested in the blog post. Of course I’m not suggesting I was directly responsible for the transformation but the owner(s) did read the post at least.

So whats changed?

Wooden Tables throughout

The decor of the old Vivid lounge was too plastic and white. It didn’t feel homey and because of that it suffered deeply. Well now the white plastic table/chairs are gone (good thing because they were falling apart anyway) and we have wooden tables and benches. Ok from Ikea but to be honest I and others couldn’t care less. Every single customer who has come in has said great things about the new look. More wood is planned and I’m sure it will be a similar effect.

The bright stark lights are all gone and now theres gentle hanging lights and plenty of tealights/candles. Its really making use of the space better now (at least on the ground floor). The top floor still needs to be sorted out as its basically a store room right now.

Feedback is less welcomed, but only because Sam the owner is convinced he knows everything. I guess its like telling Steve Jobs how to run Apple. And like Jobs, Sam has his own strong opinions which drive the momentum of VividloungeUK. He’s a bit of a perfectionist, so at least he can spot the problems. He also seems to be amassing the right people behind him (including a Fran who was a manager at Starbucks). On top of that the amount of staff has dropped down to about 2 -3 on the weekends and 1-2 during the week. Much more sensible levels of staffing.

Vivid Lounge

Saturday and Sunday before 1pm its possible to get a full english cooked breakfast and its even possible to have it delivered to your door if you call up or leave details on facebook. But there are limitations to the size of the kitchen, meaning the hugely popular vividboxes had to go. Now you have a couple choices from the specials which is every day now. There is also a menu with daily pre-made sandwiches in a fridge you can just grab if your in a rush. When I walked in today, there was some made menus on the table. I hear the full menus are coming real soon but generally you can see what they got from whats on the board and stuff in the fridge.

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Theres much more engagement with the other apartments in the area and they even deliver to Milliners Wharf, Vulcan Mills and Chips. Vivid isn’t reliant on just islington wharf anymore, theres a much more local pub feeling and they even play with the local and homemade idea in their branding.

I can’t praise Sam and VividLoungeUK enough (although I wouldn’t do the first one to his face because we regularly takes the piss out of each other). I do wish he got a proper website and there were changes to upstairs but honestly I’m impressed.

Well worth visiting and making your local if your in the New Islington area of Manchester. Look forward to a review update in another year…

Creating a site for a vivid lounge

New Vivid site

I had it with bloody Facebook… But what I can’t understand is why on earth some businesses rely on it for there business.

Vivid Lounge is one such business.

They do have the domain name vividloungeuk.com (thankfully) but as you can see nothing is there. They do on the other hand have a Facebook page with regular updates. Now I understand running a business is a lot of hard work this is why I decided to do something about it by offering them a website to replace the blank page.

I decided to use Squarespace originally because its pretty quick, solid, smart and I heard good things about it. Using pictures and content from the Facebook I was quickly able to create something useful. Unfortunately Squarespace doesn’t allow you share the site unless you pay the minimum fee. As usual my tweets are copied into facebook and Oli said something quite useful.

I debated doing this for places I likes that didn’t have functional websites. This is too true http://theoatmeal.com/comics/restaurant_website

Then a recent follow up he mentioned http://en.wordpress.com/restaurants/. WordPress for restaurants.

It looks ideal but maybe too complex for vivid lounge at this moment but could be useful for future plans