The Closure of The Coliseum

One of Manchester's alternative shopping centres, the Coliseum, closed down on 24th June 2002. Given the complete lack of information anywhere else, I have made a directory of the new premises, for the shops which had to leave.

The list is not complete, and some shops still haven't found a new site, but I'll put up details as and when I hear them. Please contact me if you have any further information :)

From Manchester Metro News (Trafford Edition) 17-05-02

FINAL BLOW FOR THE COLISEUM

MANCHESTER city centre's best-known "alternative" shopping centre is set to close - to make way for flats and offices. The Coliseum on Church Street opened with 50 retail units in 1995 as the new place for the "excitingly different".

Over the years, it has housed everything from fancy dress shops to gothic horror specialists and has been a home for the many tenants of the Corn Exchange shopping centre, closed after the IRA bomb in 1994.

But now the remaining shop owners in the centre have just six weeks to find new premises.

Tenants were given three months' notice in April, but were told negotiations were ongoing for a site just around the corner from the centre, in the Northern Quarter of the city.

"So many people in here are going to have to close up forever come June 24," said Andrea O'Connor, owner of the Resurrection vampire theme shop.

"There have been rumours for years that the centre might close, but this final announcement has left a lot of people really stuck as to what to do."

Jackie Haynes, who has run her costume shop from the centre for three years, is one of the lucky ones and has found a new location in Oldham Street.

"If we aren't careful, Manchester is going to lose all the things that make it special," she said.

Gary Allen, of gothic horror shop Bats, said: "The management let us think they had another centre for us, and people have hung on to that hope."

Plans to convert The Coliseum building into offices, flats and retail have been submitted to Manchester city council, but are yet to gain approval.

In the Manchester Metro News (Trafford Edition) 31-05-02

There was a brief questionnaire with Gary Allen from Bats in this paper. This contained the incorrect information that Bats is moving into Affleck's Palace. It's not, it's going to Affleck's ARCADE. Yes, it is the same building, and the two halves are connected, but the Arcade is not techically part of the Palace. You can enter directly through the entrance on Oldham Street, by Cyberdog, or go into Affleck's Palace and find a connecting door. There's one in the Vintage part of Vintage to Fetish on the third floor, and one near the cafe on the 1st or 2nd floor. Can't remember!