During her 70-year reign, Queen Elizabeth II always made time for Manchester.
The monarch made a number of memorable visits to the city during her record-breaking reign, which saw her spend seven decades on the throne – the longest of any reigning monarch in British history.
Celebrating Manchester’s historic moments and offering her sympathies in tough times, from walking the infamous Coronation Street cobbles to visiting injured children who had been hospitalised by the Manchester Arena attack, the late Monarch was always on hand to mark some of the city’s key moments with a kind word or a friendly wave.
Acting as a stabilising and reassuring presence for many years, she could be relied upon to join Mancunians for celebrations on important occasions and support and to commiserate with us whenever tragedy has struck.
The Queen last visited Greater Manchester just a year ago but she paid many a visit over the decades. She was dearly loved – and will be greatly missed by people across Ashton, Droylsden and Failsworth. She promised to serve the nation and she kept that word throughout her life. pic.twitter.com/EJLqdyeK5k
Following the attack at Manchester Arena in 2017, Her Majesty visited young victims in hospital who had been injured at the Ariana Grande concert and spoke with staff treating victims of the explosion.
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On a visit to Royal Manchester children’s hospital, she described the event as “very wicked” and whilst speaking with hospital clinicians, doctors, nurses and porters added that: “the awful thing was that everyone was so young. The age of them”, echoing the thoughts of shocked locals.
The Commonwealth Games
#royal#flashback "JULY 25, 2002: England captain David Beckham and Kirsty Howard hand the Queen's Jubille baton to Queen Elizabeth II after its final leg around the city of Manchester stadium at the opening of the Commonwealth Games. pic.twitter.com/yCOmZ4FUyO
Her Majesty visited the city many times to celebrate positive moments, including the Commonwealth Games in 2002 – something of a momentous occasion for Manchester.
During the opening ceremony at the City of Manchester Stadium, she was handed the Jubilee Baton by none other than David Beckham and Kirsty Howard after its final leg had been completed.
The Queen visited the city in the summer of 1992 to open Manchester’s Metrolink and unveiled a plaque on St Peter’s Square, meeting a group of local school children as part of her visit.
In her most recent visit to Manchester in 2021, Queen Elizabeth re-visited the famous Coronation Street cobbles and popped into the one and only Rover’s Return pub to mark the soap’s diamond jubilee.
Her Majesty travelled to Manchester for a tour of the studios, having last seen them in 1982, and was astonished to hear that the iconic cobbles were the very same ones she had walked on during her last visit, despite the set having been moved.
Technically this was not a visit made by the Queen to Manchester as the final FA Cup match was held at Wembley Stadium, but this was an important moment nonetheless as the Queen presented the season cup to the club in the summer of 1963.
A huge supporter of many sports including football, a number of events have been called off following her passing out of respect for the late Monarch.
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Marking 50 years of the Heinz Factory
Congratulations to Queen Elizabeth on reaching her #PlatinumJubilee with 70 years of dedicated service to our wonderful country. 👑
We are sharing this fond memory of her majesty at our Wigan factory celebrating 50 years since it opened & her 57th year on the throne. #HM70pic.twitter.com/Xy21Y3sUnU
Queen Elizabeth II visited Wigan’s Heinz Factory in 2009 to mark the anniversary of the official opening of the plant 50 years ago.
The Wigan factory is the largest food processing plant in Europe and the largest of Heinz’s factories around the world. As part of the visit a new Heinz packing operation was opened and started by the Queen.
Vanilli’s – the Manchester bakery and dessert spot that has carried on the tradition of an old Italian favourite
Danny Jones
Vanilli’s Cake Company is one of those names whose reach extends far and wide, with a history that goes way back into the past, and a deeper Greater Manchester heritage than you can imagine.
It’s one almost as rich as the desserts they’ve been making across the city centre and beyond for decades, but it also begins back in Italy.
Formerly San Marco Products, a fellow cult-favourite bakery, suppliers and catering company from way back, owner Sapna Kumar took over their old premises on Crown Industrial Estate over in Ancoats more than six years ago, and has been carrying on their sweet treat traditions ever since.
The difference these days is that it’s gone from more of an Italian ‘pasticceria’ to a Mancunian bakery with both local and Indian roots.
Born out of pregnancy cravings ahead of her third child, ironically, Vanilli’s Cake Co. went from an unfortunately timed passion project conceived on the cusp of the pandemic to a mainstay of Greater Manchester and North West markets and now part of a mini Manc empire in the making.
After taking control of the old commercial premises back in 2020, their understated but impressively high-output unit still has lots of regulars in the know coming in for the good stuff, but still operates somewhat under the radar.
Maybe that’s part of the reason their quality control has remained at such a high level: although they provide to plenty of vendors all across the city and wider region, they’ve never overextended themselves to the point that even the slightest of standards slips.
If you’ve met Sapna before – the charismatic matriarch behind this brand and others like spin-off Cake Bar Co. and most recently, Punjabee – you’ll know that she doesn’t do anything by half measures.
And yes, there are Vanilli’s desserts on sale here, too.
A familiar face at the likes of Foodie Friday and various other street food stalls across the 10 boroughs and even further afield, she’s been doing some of these events since the very outset.
Sadly, without going into too much detail, she admits that there have been instances where her generosity has been “taken advantage of on more than one occasion”, but they will never stop her continuing to offer a helping hand.
The difference this time, however, is that she’s not simply putting others before herself all the time anymore; the Manc mum who’s played mother to many through her work over the years is finally shouting about herself and her unsung but nevertheless dedicated and talented team more.
And not just a little bit, either (no half measures, remember?) – she proudly proclaims that not only does Vanilli’s serve up some of the most authentic traditional recipes, but she happily lays claim to whipping up “the best Manchester tart” you’ll find anywhere.
As for this location, specifically, she simply wants to give people like you a reminder that it’s been there for more than 30 years at this point
She’s also looking to rebuild support throughout the community by teaming up with local brands and creators moving forward. Again, it’s about time she finally got on the receiving end of ‘You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours’, which sounds like it’s long overdue.
Having recently put on a speciality spread for us, showcasing not only the classic but some fresh new ideas and creative takes on familiar, we can assure you some very delicious things are coming from Vanilli’s throughout the rest of 2026.
So, if like Sapna, you love “indulging in the sweeter side of life”, give a Vanilli’s cake, pastry or one of their other tasty desserts soon.
Find all of these and more at Unit 8, Crown Industrial, Poland Street, M4 6BN. (Credit: The Manc)
Blossoms deliver most rock and roll performance in years as Declan McKenna joins them on stage
Danny Jones
Last night, we were fortunate enough to be there in the flesh not only to see Blossoms play a special anniversary show in Manchester, but to witness Declan McKenna join them on stage.
A tiny part of us was wondering if we’d see Rick Astley roll out into the venue, but let’s just say we’ll absolutely take this.
Celebrating a decade to the day since the release of the self-titled debut LP – yes, we feel old, too – Blossoms announced the one-off intimate show at The Deaf Institute, a venue they hadn’t played in 12 whole years (good lord…), and it served as much more than a night of nostalgia.
But we’ll admit, the highlight was almost certainly seeing the ‘Brazil’ and ‘British Bombs’ singer join Tom Ogden, Charlie Salt, Josh Dewhurst, Myles Kellock and Joe Donovan on stage for their smallest gig since god knows when.
We’ve gotten somewhat used to seeing the Enfield-born solo artist popping up at random venues across the country and even performing DJ sets at local pubs.
If you haven’t seen that Kylie Minogue clip before, you really need to…
However, we don’t think anyone in the crowd was expecting this cameo, let alone hearing them perform a co-written track off the new record live in front of the audience for the very first time.
As if all of this wasn’t already a bit bonkers and left-field, the song in question, entitled ‘Additional Driver’, was self-admittedly so surprising in SO many ways that Tom felt he needed to explain the full story behind it and why Declan shouted “shoulda got the 192” before they started playing.
Yes, in some kind of Greater Mancunian fever dream, we’ve finally got artists writing lyrics about the region’s most infamous bus route that we’re sure most, if not all of you, can relate to.
But it wasn’t just this moment that had us debating in our heads, ‘are they the best Manc or maybe in Northern band full stop going right now?’, it was seeing them slip so seamlessly back into the more straight-down-the-line indie rock from their first chapter of studio material that did it.
Everyone knows and loves the biggest bangers from that inaugural outing: ‘Getaway’, ‘Charlemagne’, ‘At Most a Kiss’, ‘Honey Sweet’, etc.; but it’s hard to forget just how quintessentially rock and roll tunes like ‘Blow Rose’, ‘Cut Me and I’ll Bleed’, ‘Texia’ and even some of the other deep cuts/early releases are.
Don’t get us wrong, we love how much the dressing up (musically and quite literally) they’ve done over the years as their production, creativity and experimentation has increased, but it’s always hard to beat that feeling you get when finding an artist’s first album – especially one as good as Blossoms‘.
In fairness, listening back to ‘Deep Grass’ all these years later, we’ll still remember how spacey, psychedelic and downright different that intro felt back in the day; it now feels like a fitting end to that maiden outing and the perfect jumping-off point for what has been a real sonic exploration ever since.
For a lad born in SK2 and lucky enough to have seen these lads right from the start, stuff like this will never not feel surreal to me.
Long live ‘Blossoms from Stockport‘, and roll on Songs From The Wedding Cake this October.
The Manc -
9th September 2022 
