Northern Quarter
My final chosen location is going to be set in Manchester city centre, within the Northern Quarter district. The NQ is specific area off Piccadilly Gardens. It was formed in the 90's and became part of the regeneration of Manchester.
"The 'Northern Quarter' as such did not exist as a distinct area until the mid-1990s when a number of interested parties got together and defined a boundary, came up with the name and branded the area as such. This has proved extremely successful."
The Northern Quarter is popular today for its numerous bars and cafes, as well as its mix of music and clothes shops. Amongst these is Affleck's Palace, a former department store which has been turned into a multi-storey bazaar for alternative clothing and knick-knacks.
The Northern Quarter is popular today for its numerous bars and cafes, as well as its mix of music and clothes shops. Amongst these is Affleck's Palace, a former department store which has been turned into a multi-storey bazaar for alternative clothing and knick-knacks.
Meanwhile, the area is something of a mecca for DJs, with shops such as Piccadilly Records, Vinyl Exchange, Vox Pop Records, Beatin' Rhythm, Vinyl Resting Place, Eastern Bloc Records etc...
Nightlife in the Northern Quarter includes music venues. The area is also famous for its bar scene.
The area is also known as a home to the creative industries, and in particular fashion design, with various designers, agencies, and clothing wholesalers populating its back streets. There are also a number of commercial art galleries in the area and street art is on prominent display. In Stevenson Square, the street level remains of a former public convenience are used by the OuthouseMCR organisation for regularly changing examples of street and graffiti art. OuthouseMCR also manages the urban art which decorates an electrical sub-station on Tib Street. On one wall of the sub-station, protected by Perspex, is said to be a painting by the artist Banksy.
It is a place where I have partially grown up in, during my late teen years whilst I studied at college I used to shop heavily in the vintage shops and buy albums, art books and prints from the individual shops there.
Manchester city centre is a 45 minute bus from my home house and about 50 minutes on the train from Leeds. This means I can always return quite easily and cheaply throughout my project if I ever need to further reference the area through photography or general knowledge.
Photoshoot plan
The plan for the shoot was to mostly focus on typography within the NQ. There were no restrictions on what types of typography could be captured, this was so theres a wide variety.
Following my instinct I captured what mostly interested me, whether it being letter forms, font, display type etc... no matter the scale.
Camera: Olympus PEN E-PL1 (Digital) - consciously chosen to get the most high resolution photographs possible. It is stated within the summer brief that this is a preferred requirement. It also opens up many more possibilities when it comes to printing later on in the project, especially large scale.
