It feels even colder and wetter than Manchester as I step off the train at Blackburn. But it is this climate that allowed the cotton industry to thrive here and whose legacy the inaugural British Textile Biennial (which runs...
Read MoreWatercolours can get a bad press. For me they conjure up an image of legions of Sunday painters out in the field with their Windsor & Newtons. It’s great for mindfulness and I would always be happy to join them, but...
Read MoreWhen the Northern Soul Editor was called away at the last minute, our willing Opera Correspondent stepped into her shoes and joined me for mid-morning brunch at Manchester’s Midland Hotel. On my way, I stopped at the post...
Read MoreHaving previously appeared in Northern Soul restaurant reviews merely as Robert Hamilton’s dining companion The Brunette, I was honoured to be entrusted with writing as well as eating (as Mr Hamilton was stuck on the tarmac at...
Read MoreMany people flying from the UK to Naples head straight for the Amalfi coast, put off entering the city by stories of the Camorra, handbag snatchers on scooters, crazy traffic and Vesuvius, an active volcano. But is Naples really...
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