Fascinating Photos Show What Manchester Looked Like in the 1960s

Manchester in the 1960s was a city caught between its industrial past and an uncertain future. The local economy was under serious strain. Between 1961 and 1983, the city lost 150,000 manufacturing jobs. Cotton processing, trading, and heavy industry — the pillars that had made Manchester one of Britain’s great industrial cities — were all in steep decline. The Royal Exchange, a historic symbol of the city’s commercial power, ceased trading in 1968. The effects were felt across every neighbourhood.

The population reflected this hardship. At the start of the decade, around 662,000 people lived in Manchester. By 1971, that number had fallen to approximately 544,000. Residents were leaving in large numbers, and the city’s housing stock — much of it Victorian-era terraced rows — was increasingly considered unfit for modern life. Authorities responded with a wave of demolitions and rebuilding projects that would permanently reshape the city.

Piccadilly Gardens remained one of the city centre’s most recognisable public spaces throughout the decade. It served as a gathering point for shoppers, workers, and commuters, and it sat at the heart of a city centre that was changing fast. The surrounding streets were filling with new construction projects, and the skyline was beginning to shift.

One of the most significant additions to Manchester’s skyline came in 1962, when the CIS Tower — the Co-operative Insurance Society’s headquarters — became the tallest office block in the United Kingdom. Three years later, in 1965, the Piccadilly Plaza complex opened, adding a modern hotel, offices, and retail space to the city centre. These weren’t isolated projects; they were part of a deliberate push to modernise a city that had relied on 19th-century infrastructure for too long.

No area of Manchester saw more dramatic change during the 1960s than Hulme. The neighbourhood, just south of the city centre, had been densely packed with back-to-back terraced houses dating back to the early 19th century. By the mid-1960s, planners had earmarked large sections of Hulme for clearance. Streets were emptied, buildings were demolished, and entire blocks were flattened in preparation for new high-rise housing developments.

Before the bulldozers moved in, photographers captured what Hulme actually looked like. The images are striking. Corner shops sat at the ends of tight terraced rows. Schools, pubs, and churches were surrounded by streets that had housed working-class families for generations. The George Inn on the junction of Radnor Street and Pinder Street was left standing alone after the surrounding buildings were demolished — a pub with no neighbourhood left around it.

The scale of the Hulme clearances is difficult to fully grasp without seeing the photographs. Aerial and elevated views from around 1967 show vast open stretches of bare ground where entire streets had stood just months before. Construction machinery had already moved in on the eastern edges of the neighbourhood, beginning the work of replacing what had been demolished.

While Hulme was being torn apart, the city centre was being rebuilt. The Mancunian Way — an elevated urban motorway — was under construction from the mid-1960s. Designed to carry traffic around the southern edge of the city centre, it was one of the most ambitious road projects in Manchester’s history at that point. Photographs from 1966 show the concrete sections rising above street level, cutting through the existing urban fabric.

Manchester’s streets in the 1960s still held a strong Victorian character in many areas. King Street, for example, was lined with substantial 19th-century office buildings and institutional facades, including the Bank of England’s branch office. Albert Square and its Albert Memorial looked much as they had for decades, while St Peter’s Square offered a clear view of the Cenotaph, the Central Library, and the Town Hall Extension.

Manchester’s transport infrastructure was also changing. Manchester Central Station, which had opened in the Victorian era, was still operating through the mid-1960s, with diesel trains on its platforms and passengers moving through its grand concourse. At Ringway Airport, British European Airways aircraft were a common sight, reflecting the growing role of air travel in connecting Manchester to the rest of Europe.

Education was a major part of Manchester’s story in the 1960s. The University of Manchester was expanding, adding new buildings for mathematics, science and technology, and student accommodation. The Manchester College of Art and Design opened a major new extension in 1966, with Princess Margaret attending the official opening on 2nd October of that year. The Hollings Building — nicknamed the Toast Rack for its distinctive ribbed shape — stood out as one of the most architecturally unusual structures in the city.

Student life in Manchester during the 1960s had a creative energy. At the Regional College of Art, students worked in studios and workshops, while the library served as a quiet hub for research. Fashion shows were held in the Assembly Hall of the Chatham Building at the Manchester College of Art and Design. In 1968, a balloon structure appeared in the University Quadrangle — one of the more unusual visual records of student experimentation during the decade.

Everyday commercial life continued across the city despite the upheaval. Shoppers browsed Marks & Spencer at the junction of Cross Street, Corporation Street, and St Mary’s Gate. The annual Whit Walk procession moved along Market Street in 1966, drawing crowds as it had for years. Pubs like the Lass O’ Gowrie on Charles Street and neighbourhood cinemas like the Scala on Wilmslow Road in Withington remained part of daily life for thousands of Mancunians.

The city’s media presence was growing too. Granada Television’s headquarters was under construction at the very start of the decade, and ABC Television House on Mount Street was already established by 1960. These buildings reflected Manchester’s emerging role as a centre of broadcasting in the north of England.