Walking Tours

Walking Tours

I design walking tours to suit my guests - perhaps starting at your office or conference venue and ending at a pub or restaurant. Some ideas are given here.


Manchester Women

Suffragettes, socialites, sexworkers, millworkers, millionaires, pioneers, protestors. Hear stories of Mancunian women of the past including an entrepreneur, a millionaire widow, a Mummy and the city's first socialite.

Women in the Footnotes

Hear the stories of sidelined women, hidden in the footnotes of the city's history, or seemingly incidental to the stories of men. Tales of murder, riots, medicine, humiliation, punishment, maternity, mystery, marriage and death, reveal the lives of ordinary Manchester women over the centuries.

Animals of Manchester

Animals have been loved, used, and abused, by the people of Manchester over the centuries. Hear how animals feature in the city's history - in sport, entertainment, medicine, fashion, food, and work. Dogs and frogs, birds and bees, rats and cats, as well as horses, pigs, elephants, and more...

Manchester from 1900 to 1914

Find out about Manchester at the start of a new century. With the death of a queen after a long reign, the Victorian era gave way to an Edwardian age of change. We will explore the new architecture, fashions, and entertainments, and examine new unions and the Manchester-born suffragette movement.

Seven Deadly Sins

Explore the city and its history through the theme of the Seven Deadly Sins. Hear stories of Mancunians' greed, lust, gluttony, wrath, envy, pride and sloth. A central, short walk, covering aspects of Manchester history from the 1800s, 1910s, 1930s, 1960s, 1980s and 2000s.

1920s Manchester

Find out about a city reeling from war and pandemic, in grief, debt, and unrest, but also moving forward in a decade of contrast. Amidst new consumerism, a growing nightlife, and daring fashions, life was changing, especially for women. Did the 20s roar in Manchester?

Spinningfields

Today's 21st Century area of glass and glamour, finance and food, was once Manchester's worst slum. From the gothic grandeur of John Rylands Library, to stories of gangs, bodysnatching, sexwork, cholera, river rescues, an Ice Maiden and a couple in love.

Pioneer Protest Performance

This walking tour of central Manchester covers the city's themes of protest, performance and pioneer. Hear stories of radical history including massacre and mayhem, and how this Cottonopolis developed to be 'as great a human exploit as Athens'.

Valette's Manchester

Adolphe Valette was Manchester's own French Impressionist painter, capturing a city of activity and industry. This tour visits the places he painted - glistening cobbles, twinkling lights, bustling streets. Hear stories of the man but also of the buildings, streets and the people of these areas.

Warehouses, Whitworth, Valette, Vimto & the Village

An eclectic Manchester mix. With characters as diverse as Alan Turing and 'Spanking Roger', hear tales ranging from the city's role in the moon landings to the invention of a temperance drink, while discovering hidden features on some unlikely streets.

Castlefield

Explore Castlefield, from Roman origins, canals and railways, to today's neighbourhood seen on TV and film. With stories of heartbreak, endeavour, popstars, pioneers, tragedy, triumphs, we cover Britain's first Urban Heritage Park.

Northern Quarter

The buildings and streets of today's quirky, chaotic, creative Northern Quarter, still hold clues to Manchester's past. With tales of markets, mourning, music and more, discover a pineapple, a broom, a hidden river and cotton woven into the streets.

Campfield

Explore an area of the city wedged between Spinningfields and Castlefield. Cross a graveyard and hear of pioneer, potatoes, bollards, a fair, a flight, conmen, eyes, weapons, TV, and door frames as well as plenty of Manchester firsts.

Entertainment Street

Centred around Peter St and Oxford St, explore the history of the city at play, with stories of culture, music, drama and drinking. Hear of a musical traitor, a pioneering theatre-owner, an elephant, a 1960s law to shut down the fun, and much more.

Old Town

Visit an area around the Cathedral and Chetham's Library, where Manchester grew from a sleepy village to today's city. Hear of a seige, a royal visit, a music hall tragedy and a table which changed the world.

Salford around the Irwell

A central walk but on the Salford side of the Irwell. Hear of calamity on the river, a rescuing hero, Victorian gangs, 19th Century sporting Salfordians, the attractions of prison, a seige and a royal visit.

Angel Meadow

Explore a northern area of the city including Angel Meadow, once a Victorian slum described as 'Hell upon Earth'. Hear of squalor and cholera but also of 18th Century air travel, a mill, an early skyscraper, the co-operative movement and NOMA.

Britannia Basin

Explore an area along the Bridgewater Canal, once a rural idyll, then industrial hub and now predominantly residential. Discover this 'village' within a city, with stories of Hulme Hall, rowing, regattas, mills, molasses and 21st Century city living.

Ancoats

The world's pioneer industrial suburb, where workers lived in the shadows of huge mills, once attracted and shocked tourists. Now the city's most rapidly-changing district provides a rich area for discovery.

Doctors, Disease & Cure

Hear how Manchester's early doctors tackled illness and ailments in a growing town, and of the hospitals they set up. With stories of cholera, corpses, accidents, ethics, maternity and a mummy.

Protest, Conflict & Peace

Hear the 'voices of the people' - gay voices, women's voices, immigrant voices - as we explore Manchester's history of protest and Mancunians in conflicts, and their actions for peace, over centuries.

Around the River Medlock

The city gives us occasional glimpses of this meandering river. Our route covers new and old, taking in the shiny C21st towers of Deansgate Square, and the mills and industry of the past.

Gaythorn

Explore an area near the Rochdale Canal towards First Street. From warehouses and mills, to music and culture. Stories of the earth moving, a hidden canal, a German, a Russian, dancing, fighting, a rescuing dog and much more.

Manchester Outcasts

Hear a selection of tales from Manchester's history of those who were snubbed, rejected, abused or dimissed, whether because of their gender, sexuality, class, race or health. Find out about the city's LGBTQ+ history, the impact of the colour bar, the marriage bar, and much more.

Missable Manchester

This walk ignores the obvious and takes note of the unnoticed. We look at street names, door frames, bollards, cobbles, plaques, windows, and other overlooked objects and buildings and find out what these items reveal about Manchester's past.

Fashionable Clubs and Societies

Hear tales of the fashionable clubs and societies of 19th Century Manchester, centred on what was the city's handsomest street. Not all cotton and commerce, the city was keen to show its culture - art, literature, science, philosophy, billiards and more.

Do you need a custom tour ?

I offer bespoke tours tailored to your specifications