Mystery as beloved Manchester bar with historic past closes suddenly without notice

Mystery surrounds the sudden closure of a popular bar in Manchester city centre. The Footage, on the corner of Grosvenor Street and Oxford Road, has been a popular drinking spot for students for years , boasting offers and being close to the Manchester Metropolitan University campus and the University of Manchester.

But the venue - operated by Crafted Social, part of the Stonegate Group - has been listed as ‘permanently closed’ on its website. There has been no other announcement on social media about the closure.

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A pop-up message on the website’s booking form tells guests that the venue, which it described itself online as 'the greatest bar in Manchester', closed on Saturday (May 25) and thanked guests for their custom. The pop-up said: “We will no longer be trading after the 25th May. It has been a pleasure serving the community and we shall miss you!”

Just four days earlier (May 23), the venue had been sharing posts on social media promoting the upcoming Euro's and encouraging people to 'secure the best seats and deals' by booking spots at the pub.

Posting on social media, one person said they felt that The Footage’s closure was the ‘biggest loss to Manchester since Font’. Just last week, it was announced that the former The Font bar on New Wakefield Street, which closed at the start of 2023, will reopen at the end of June as a new Irish bar.

The history of the Footage building dates back to 1915 when it first opened as the Grosvenor Picture Palace cinema. The largest cinema outside of London at the time, the first film screened at the venue was the silent historical film Jane Shore, starring British actress Blanche Forsythe.