Where to spend New Year’s Eve in Manchester

The upper floor of this Grade II listed Wesleyan chapel lay empty for 40 years before Mission Mars bought the building in 2012 and opened it up as a music venue. The only question is why didn’t anyone do it sooner?

Almost Famous Manchester Great Northern is a local legend. It’s OTT in every way. It’s brash, bold and doesn’t seem to care about pissing people off. None of that attention-grabbing means a thing if the burgers aren’t worth the hype. But they are. Almost Famous is the original dirty burger guru and it is by far the best.

So called because the performers used to play on a stage situated halfway up the wall, Band on the Wall has been a stalwart of the Manchester music scene for about 200 years.

Banyan in Manchester’s Corn Exchange has something for everyone and one of the best outdoor drinking and dining spots in the city.

Bundobust is a huge beer hall serving craft ales in the heart of Manchester’s Piccadilly Gardens. It also happened to win Restaurant of the Year at the 2017 Manchester Food and Drink Festival awards, thanks to its stellar menu of Indian small plates.

If it’s all-day eating you’re after, all-day eating you’ll get at Cosy Club Manchester, and as you study the menu under the watchful eye of a selection of taxidermy and portrait paintings, you’ll quickly notice that there really is something for everyone here.

Dakota Grill Manchester is the work of former Malmaison owner, Ken McCollough and it is as dark-hued and handsome as the successful boutique hotel chain. It’s an inviting place with flickering candlelight, very retro-sexy – sure to be the setting for many a first date.

The focus at Dakota is on steaks which are very good – all grass-fed, 28 day-aged, hand-cut Aberdeenshire beef cooked over hot coals.

Ducie Street Warehouse is all sorts of things, but one of those things is a restaurant. It’s an all-day affair with everything from classic brunches to late-night cocktails. On the menu you’ll find a good selection of small sharing dishes and large plates – it’s a sociable kind of place. And of course, you’ll also find Ducie Street Warehouse’s signature focaccia flatbreads.

“Yet more small plates in Ancoats?” we hear you cry. Well yes, but trust us, Erst is worth your attention. This is a place for serious foodies so don’t come looking for mac n cheese balls. Plenty of other places can satisfy that filthy craving for you.

Food hall meets music festival is how we’d describe Freight Island to anyone confused about what they’ll find at this regenerated rail depot beyond Piccadilly Station. 

Fenix is a simple, rustic Greek restaurant as re-imagined by World of Interiors. The palette of creams and neutral stones is minimalist and sophisticated. It’s rather pared back considering Fenix is from the team behind Tattu but still a sense of opulence prevails.

With its terrace overlooking Oxford Road and its much-photographed spiral staircase, Fumo is a favourite spot in Manchester for dinner and drinks with friends.

Grand Pacific is the work of Living Ventures and it easily outshines its sibling venues in terms of pure glamour. Not in a big chandeliers, glass and chrome Spinningfields way, but with a decadent blend of colonial Raffles-style grandeur and some of the best of the city’s Victorian architecture.

A fine-dining restaurant inside a casino with a celeb chef name above the door? Alarm bells. Yes, James Martin has his name across the massive billboard outside, but this is not an ostentatious venue.

King Street Townhouse is a 4-star luxury hotel in the heart of Manchester City Centre. It’s well known for its spa facilities – including a very special infinity pool with views of the city from the top floor of the building.

The Pen and Pencil is the Northern Quarter’s cool all-day hangout, modelled on the New York bar of the same name popular with the city’s journalists and ad men in the 1950s and 1960s. It has a reputation for great cocktails, quality food and an atmosphere that makes it stand out from nearby imitators.

With its terrace overlooking Albert Square and Manchester Town Hall, and a beautiful interior featuring a 40-seater private dining room, an open kitchen, and an oyster bar, Piccolino Caffé Grande Manchester is a real destination restaurant. (And, notably, it’s one that doesn’t price people out of the experience.)

The Japanese word MUSU translates as ‘infinite possibilities’ and while Chef Patron Michael Shaw’s quartet of menus may not be infinite they are certainly unique for Manchester at least. With a combination of Japanese and more locally-sourced ingredients, the guest is invited to choose the way they prefer to dine at MUSU.

Opened in the summer of 2022 after a hefty refurb which transformed the tired-looking New Century Hall of the mid-twentieth century into a newfangled music and dining destination in Manchester’s trendy NOMA district.

San Carlo is Manchester’s most famous and, some say, best Italian restaurant. Run by the Distefano family, it’s said to have one of the largest turnovers in the UK. It’s also the place to be papped and you’ll sometimes see a bank of photographers outside to prove the point.

Sexy Fish is no mere minnow in the UK dining scene. It’s brought to you by Caprice Holdings, the group behind some of London’s most glam dining spots. Think of it as more of a humongous mermaid – beautiful and ever so slightly improbable.

If you’re into EDM or club culture you’ll know The Warehouse Project as one of Manchester’s biggest nights out. It opened for the first time in 2006 and has returned for its four-month seasonal run every year since.

A real Northern success story, the second location for Bundobust in Manchester and the fourth in the family of northern-based restaurants (Manchester Piccadilly, Leeds and Liverpool have come before), the Bundobust Brewery is a welcome addition to Oxford Street at the southern part of the city.

With a menu that mirrors its sister restaurants, the food is a reliable selection of Indian-style vegetarian small plates. Expect to find crisp okra fries dusted with black salt and mango powder and the iconic vada pav – a deep-fried mashed potato ball in a bun, with red and green chutneys.