The Firehouse Manchester - By night

The Firehouse Manchester. A super stylish interior

If there’s one thing I used to do a lot of, it is going out. In my younger days I loved clubbing. It was my life, but like most people, as you get older and “grow up”, those wild night outs grow less and they change in nature. It’s not about going out on Thursday, club, afterparty, same thing Friday, Same thing Saturday and back home for 2 hours kip on a Sunday night, before getting up for work on Monday. Those days were fun, but that’s not how you roll when you have a family and responsibilities. Now that’s not to say I don’t still love a good dance, I bloody do, but nights out now have more specific requirements, a good vibe, good people, nice toilets, good music, but somewhere you can sit down and still have a chat.

We are suckers for a mirrorball

....And this ones surrounded by hot pink light !

Now, this is something that we have struggled with in our home town of Manchester. We have had lots of nights out and we’ve never found anywhere that was good to go. Our group of friends are a good group. Most of us have been friends for about 30 years, there’s been a few new partners and additions over the years, but overall there’s a lot of history there. We all grew close through clubbing, meeting up in the 90’s and hitting Manchester’s famous venues like The Hacienda, Sankeys and more. So the location, vibe and music in a place is important. I hate anywhere with a bad atmosphere, any kind of aggression, or the type of person that wants to kick off, look down their nose at you, or bring any kind of negative vibe is an instant no no for me. I’m not about that. I don’t need that in my life. Another must is good music, it matters to me. Luckily the same can be said for all my group, we’re on the same page. We have tried so many different places over the years and always been a little bit disappointed. So to finally find somewhere after all of these years was so good. That place is The Firehouse in Manchester.

One of the runway performers

It’s in what is one of Manchester’s coolest areas, the Northern Quarter, covering most of the Ancoat’s area, it used to be a run down, former industrial area, full of bombed out mills, dark back streets and unsavoury characters. Now it is full of indie bars, restaurants, shops etc and had it going on. The Northern Quarter area has grown and grown fast. The Firehouse venue is an old garage, and also houses a sister venue called Ramona, which specialises in Detroit style pizzas, which are pretty darn fit. The décor has been done well. The bones of the garage still remain, with high ceilings, corrugated iron roof, roller shutter, bare brick and some of the old features. It’s cool. It also has a giant mirror ball. I’m a firm believer that if you stick a giant mirror ball in any space, it instantly makes it a million times better. There’s a cool outside space, with lots of seating which makes this a great place to spend a lazy afternoon in the sun.

During the day it’s bright and airy, everything is clean and super well presented. The menu is great and we’ve eaten here a lot. There’s a full post on the food side of things here.

Read our daytime review of The Firehouse here

But, we’re here to talk about the night time and how good it is for a night out. I had eaten at Ramona, then I saw on the socials that they were opening The Firehouse, the half price food and drink offer for their soft launch grabbed my attention, so I booked it for some food and a few afternoon beers with my Friend. We had a good time, such a good time that I booked again 2 days later for a full family meal. We all loved it. The daytime vibe feels almost holiday ish, it’s hard to explain, but it feels like you are not in the UK and in a good way. During my day visit I was checking out the DJ booth. Great setup, with full CDJ and a set of Technics and some nice big speakers all around, I find that this is usually a pretty good indication of good music, add in the giant mirrorball and I’m getting even more interested. So, the next time we had a babysitter, I booked us a night time table. As always I’d done a little research and found that the night looked interesting. An eclectic music policy and what are described as Live arthouse performances and a dance, freedom and movement ethos sounded pretty interesting and something a little different.

We went for food first so landed in The Firehouse at about 11 ish. The party was in full swing. The vibe is cool, but not pretentious, by night it feels like a New York loft party type of vibe. The music is loud, but not too loud, so you can still have a chat when you’re sat at your table, which is good. There’s groups of people hanging around, some people having a dance, but all having a good time. The bar is busy, but you get served in good time as the bar staff are super efficient, even banging out cocktails, with no fuss or delay. More on the cocktails later.

The runway shows are amazing to watch and a unique touch

We had a table for drinks booked and were seated on a long table, running right across the full width of the venue, our server told us with a wink that in a few minutes we might be best holding our drinks, she left this with us. We soon found out why. At certain points of the night, the music changes tempo slightly, then on the balcony a character will appear, now this could a super glam, long legged blonde stunning lady in a sequin leotard, or a toned bronzed man, with a super toned body, squeezed into a catsuit. Whatever you see, it will be fabulous and super camp. They will parade down the stairs, to claps and cheers, the crowd will part as they groove their way through, and head towards the long table that we were sat on. The steps at the side were a bit of a clue. So, be warned the table is not actually a table, it’s a catwalk. We took the advice and moved our drinks as a pair of super high, black patent leather platform boots, swished past us in a super confident strut. These beauties parade up and down the catwalk, dancing and prancing to the music and putting a show that delights the eager crowd. They play of to this delight, blowing kisses, shaking booties to all and sundry, those who are super keen to be a part of the show and those that are a little more reserved. It works super well at getting the party started. It looks and feels good. It’s so camp and has an outrageous feel to it. The style of this is to reflect flamboyant queer parties and reflect it, it does, now if this was just scantily clad females doing this, or cheesy male stripper type blokes, it would attract a very different type of crowd, but it’s not. You have to accept that a man in a catsuit might stroke your chest as he walks by and blows you a kiss, some people just can not handle that type of outrageous campness. This addition is a very clever piece of promoting. Doing something like this is like it’s own door policy. This type of person that would be outraged by this type of queer showboating, is usually, let’s be honest a bit of a twat. They would hate The Firehouse and never come in, if they did, they wouldn’t come back. Good, I don’t want to share my night with you. So this type of natural selection, means that the crowd is already good. There’s a real mix of people male, female, queer, straight, people of all nationalities and backgrounds, but all there for a damn good night out and a lot of fun. That’s pretty much perfect if you ask me. We’ve been to The Firehouse a lot and we always end up chatting to people, we always find someone super interesting to talk to, creative types, fashionable types, but always fun and happy types. This says a lot about a venue as the people make the party.

Beware... Things can get raunchy. No prudes allowed

One other key part that makes the party is the music. Now, I know I always bang on about music, but it is important. The music in The Firehouse is good, it’s eclectic, it covers all bases and it covers them well. Being the boring DJ type that I am, I always go over and have a chat with the DJ. I’m what you might call a trainspotter, an anorak if you like. If the DJ plays a track that I like, I like to let them know. A little thumbs up, a cheeky wink and a point to the record, whilst mouthing “Tune” to the DJ, is my go to compliment. I was doing this a lot at The Firehouse, the mix of soul, funk, disco, house, with cheeky drops of speed garage and even some rock are just right. The addition of some cheeky classics such as New Order – Blue Monday, Daft Punk and even some classic Hacienda era piano anthems went down well and both Clare and I are not ashamed to say, we shook our stuff more than a little.

Great music by fine selectors.... Perfect

There’s a mix of DJ’s on, but Saturdays are hosted by the pretty awesome Jonjo, part of the Bad Fun DJ collective, check out the Bad Fun Instagram here – badfunmcr who was responsible for the fantastic tunes. He’s also a top bloke and put up with me wanging on about music and clubs for ages. One thing about being a DJ, is you just want to talk about music all of the time, but we had a good chinwag about the scene.

Drinks wise, there’s a real focus on Tequila and Mezcal, this works for us. It works well, almost too well as the following mornings thick head proved. There’s a strong selection of all of the usuals, some good IPA’s which I like and a good wine list. But for us it’s all about the Margaritas. Either a standard, or if you’re feeling particularly hot, go for a Spicy Margarita. It’s a classic Margarita made with El Tequileno Blanco, Cointreau, jalapeno salsa, lime olea and tagine, traditional but with the addition of the spicy notes really hits the spot.

And a chilli salt rim, they are fit. We always have a few of these, we recommend them too. Just remember to move them off the table when the queens come down those steps.

We are so happy to have found The Firehouse and it has quickly become our go to venue in Manchester for nights out. The only negative is that it is only supposed to be temporary, I have to say, we were both pretty gutted when we found this out. The site on which both The Firehouse and Ramona stand, is actually owned by Capital & Centric and Kamani property, who have planning permission to build 200 aparthotel suites on the site. This work was due to start recently, but the owners of both venues, requested

Happy Clare & Si. Tequila and music make us happy together

An extension to their temporary permission to use the site, this was granted due to the success of them both. The owners of the venues are A Very Inc, a company founded by Joel Wilkinson, Dan Mullen and Adelaide Winter. Wilkinson and Mullen are both former directors of the Mission to Mars group, who are well known in the city as the founders of the awesome Deaf Institute, Gorilla and Alberts Schloss, so they have some fantastic experience. They have put plans in to redevelop a huge former factory a little further dow the other end of Great Ancoats st. This huge industrial space is set to house a beer hall, brewery and also stalls for independent traders and much, much more. It does sound as though the starting of this could dovetail nicely with any potential end for The Firehouse and Ramona, which would be sad and would leave a bit of a hole for us, hopefully one that the new venue, which is set to be known as The Foundry could fill. Fingers crossed.

A kiss to end the night

Let me know in the comments box about your fave place in Manchester. I love to hear all the best hotspots to sample when we're next in our home town.

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