London has decided to give up the job of capital and go into quiet retirement. When everyone north of Leicester is done cheering, England looks around for a substitute and after some consideration the nation turns to… Sorry Birmingham, but it can be only Manchester, the uncrowned capital of the north and a city embracing change like few others in Europe.
Manchester knows all about improbable scenarios and has never shied away from responsibility. After all, this was the city that gave birth to capitalism and the Industrial Revolution, so what’s a little self-inflating urban redesign to a burgh that knows a thing or two about altering the history of the world?
The change and influence of the last decade and a half has been nearly as dramatic. It began with a musical revolution, was interrupted by a bomb and has climaxed in the transformation of Manchester into a modern metropolis that has embraced 21st-century style and technology like no other in England. The envy of any urban centre in Europe, it is surely indicative of more than just northern one-upmanship over London and the south that Manchester looks to Barcelona as its main rival and inspiration.
Not only does Manchester have a wealth of fascinating museums that reflect its unique role in the pioneering developments of the Industrial Age, but it has managed to weave the mementos of its past with a forward-looking, ambitious programme of urban development that has already offered a vision of what the future might hold.
The future, according to Manchester, is to ensure that form follows function, and that cities are first and foremost human dwellings. Testament to this belief is the remarkable life on show at street level, from the trendy bars and boutiques of the bohemian Northern Quarter to the loud-and-proud attitude of the Gay Village and the chic, self-possessed stylings of the Castlefield area. Spend enough time here and you too will be infected with the palpable confidence of a city that knows it’s onto a good thing.
Minsk is a mind-blowing experience. Ostensibly, it’s a European capital, but officially, the city hearkens back to Soviet times: the KGB building is impossible to miss, and people speak about spies, wire taps and stool pigeons in their midst. Police and the military are everywhere. News is that Lukashenka is ready to send in tanks to squash protests. Yet never mind, a slick new nightclub is rolling out drum ‘n’ bass tonight. Before that, drop in to the new sushi bar.
Communist chic. Cappuccino communism. Minsk is a living oxymoron. When it all gets too bizarre to figure out – and it will – just abandon yourself and have a blast.
There’s a palpable pride about Minsk, the pride of a survivor. It has come back from the dead several times in its almost millennium of existence (the city was founded in September 1067), each time triumphantly. Currently, it’s the defiant capital of one of the few countries to actively snub US and European attempts at ‘intervention’, and the city which best approximates what life was like in the Soviet heyday of the 1970s: insular, cocooned, fun.
After Minsk was reduced to rubble during WWII, Moscow architects were given a blank slate to transform ruins into a model Soviet city. An excess of monumental classicism was to give the impression of a workers’ utopia. The wide boulevards, expansive squares and grandiose proportions of the buildings in the centre do initially impress, but eventually they take on an oppressive weight. Aside from a minuscule reconstructed Old Town, the city has few cosy corners as antidotes to the concrete, colonnaded grandeur. Evenings, when buildings are beautifully illuminated, offer a softer view of the city.
Minsk, as a clean, safe city and with few tourist attractions, is best enjoyed as the locals do – hanging out in the parks and cafés, meeting people and trying to forget about what goes on behind the Presidential Palace’s doors.
Helsinki is a sea-town par excellence and an exciting, dynamic place. Half the city seems to be water, and the tortured geography of the coastline includes any number of bays, inlets and a speckling of islands. The harbour is the heart of the city, and watching the giant ferries glide into port is a defining memory and essential Helsinki experience.
Helsinki is cool without Рas yet Рbeing self-consciously so. Unlike other capitals, you sense that people go to places because they enjoy them, not to be seen. Much modern d̩cor is ironic and humorous, and achieves stylishness by daring to differ rather than trying too hard.
While not an ancient place, much of what is loveable in Helsinki is older. The style of its glorious Art Nouveau buildings, the spacious elegance of its cafés, the careful preservation of Finnish heritage in its dozens of museums, restaurants that have changed neither menu nor furnishings since the 1930s are all part of the city’s quirky charm.
It has a very different feel to the rest of Finland, partly because before the days of the hi-tech society it was the country’s sole point of contact almost with the rest of the world.
Like all of Finland, though, Helsinki has a dual nature. In winter you sometimes wonder where all the people are. In spring and summer they are back again, packing green spaces and outdoor tables to get a piece of blessed sun, whirring around on thousands of bicycles and kicking the city’s nightlife into overdrive.
