Manchester Metropolitan Alumni transform Manchester streets with BRIT Award-inspired art

With the Brit Awards taking place in Manchester for the first time at Co-op Live this weekend, the city centre has been activated through a curated art trail led by Manchester Metropolitan University alumni.

Read more on the Manchester Metropolitan website at: https://www.mmu.ac.uk/news-and-events/news/story/brit-awards-art-trail-success-manchester-met-alumni

For those working in town and city centre management, this is more than cultural celebration - it is a practical example of how to leverage a major event to support high street vitality, reinforce identity and extend visitor movement beyond a single venue.

Six graduates from Manchester Met’s School of Art were selected by artist and curator Stanley Chow to create large-scale installations across the Northern Quarter and Ancoats. The result is a distributed trail encouraging footfall across independent retail, hospitality and cultural venues.

Jessica Lee’s The Art of Loving, inspired by BRIT nominee Olivia Dean, is installed on Lever Street. Barney Ibbotson’s U Should Not Be Doing That references Manchester’s suffragette heritage, while Florence Burns’ DISRUPT channels the energy of live music culture.

Professor of Screen Studies at our School of Digital Arts (SODA) Kirsty Fairclough, a member of the BRITs Fringe Steering Group, added: “We are immensely proud of our involvement in this year’s BRIT Awards, and particularly of the amazing contributions from our talented Art and Design graduates.  

“Manchester Met is at the heart of the creative and cultural scene here in Manchester so it’s fitting that we’re playing such a key role in the BRITs and contributing to the excitement and buzz around the city. We can’t wait to see the events unfold!” 

Why this matters for place managers

From a practitioner perspective, several place management principles are visible:

  • The awards are anchored at Co-op Live, but the art trail spreads activity into surrounding neighbourhoods - mitigating the “single venue bubble” effect
  • IPM is based at Manchester Metropolitan University, and this example underlines the wider civic role universities can play. Graduates are contributing directly to the city’s live cultural offer. Universities are not just educators; they are talent pipelines, convenors and long-term place partners.

Music and place: a live case study

For IPM members, this is particularly relevant. Music and place is one of our active areas of interest within the Institute’s research and practitioner programme.

Music shapes:

  • Night-time economies
  • City branding
  • Youth and creative sector employment
  • Cultural tourism
  • Emotional attachment to place

Manchester provides a strong case study of how music heritage and contemporary creative production continue to influence the urban economy.

As part of this strand, IPM will shortly be:

  • Hosting a webinar on Music and Place, exploring how towns and cities can better integrate live music, cultural programming and place governance.
  • Undertaking a study visit to The Piece Hall, examining how a historic asset has been repositioned as a nationally recognised live music and cultural destination, supporting regeneration and economic impact

If you are interested in opportunities exploring the concept of music and place, get in touch at ipm@mmu.ac.uk..

IPM

About the author

IPM

Formed in 2006, the Institute of Place Management is the international professional body that supports people committed to developing, managing and making places better.

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