Liverpool Report - Arriving in Liverpool is the first surprise Not 1ust the fact that I m there but that Lime Street sta~on is a palace of a place the platforms protected by a sweep of translucent arches, recently renovated and keeping off the rain while glistening light illuminates the disembarking passengers. Then, right by the station, there’s the first of the pubs. Liverpool was once the second city of the Empire and the architecture of the pubs is testament to the wealth that flowed through the port. The Crown Hotel has a large art nouveau sign for Walker’s Warrington Ales the same Walker who paid for the city art gallery that bears his name and the gilded letters hint at the interior.

Arriving in Liverpool is the first surprise Not 1ust the fact that I m there but that Lime Street sta~on is a palace of a place the platforms protected by a sweep of translucent arches, recently renovated and keeping off the rain while glistening light illuminates the disembarking passengers. Then, right by the station, there’s the first of the pubs. Liverpool was once the second city of the Empire and the architecture of the pubs is testament to the wealth that flowed through the port. The Crown Hotel has a large art nouveau sign for Walker’s Warrington Ales the same Walker who paid for the city art gallery that bears his name and the gilded letters hint at the interior.

The entrance doors have a beaten-copper surround and stained glass, there’s an extravagantly moulded ceiling and the wood panelled walls are decorated with grapes in relief. In such surroundings, it’s also nice to buy two drinks and get change from a fiver. The Crown is impressive, but the Philharmonic Dining Rooms is even more so. It’s a 10-minute walk from the station and city centre, on Hope Street, which is the only street in Britain with a cathedral at either end. Located between the Gilbert Scott-designed Anglican Cathedral (begun in 1903) and the Catholic Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King (1962-7), the Philharmonic (1899-1900), was built as a showcase for a local brewery and decorated by craftsmen more used to
fitting out the luxury transatlantic liners that sailed from the nearby docks.
It has to be one of the most ornate pubs ever created. From the giant wroughtiron gates at the entrance and the fine brass lamp hanging overhead, to the stained-glass portraits of Lord Baden-Powell and Field Marshal Earl Roberts inside (no one knows why these luminaries were chosen), it’s a place so unexpected that the staff are used to people walking around for a couple of minutes before they come to the bar. There are mosaictiled floors, polished walnut panelling and ornate plasterwork everywhere, including moulded caryatids in the former billiard room. The pub is undergoing a careful — and slow — process of renovation under landlord Marie-Louise Wor but then, it transpires over the course of a weekend, s( is the city Compared with Yorkshiremen, Liverpudlians are slow in coming forward about their: home, but Liverpool fancies its chances to be Britain’s Capital of Culture in 2008. The announcement won’t be made until 2003, giving the winning city five years to make the most of the opportunity but in the meantime, along with contenders such as Birmingham and Newcast: the city is spending money like it hasn’t for nearly a century What isn’t in the process of being renovatec refurbished or restored is being built. Opposite the pub is the Pub as a work of art: the Crown Hotel in Lime Street Philharmonic Hall (1933-39), with its astonishing art deco interior of Egyptian detailing. Meanwhile, further along Hope Street, work is oontinuin~ on the renovation of the Metropolitan Cathedral. Its Edwin Lutyens crypt — the only evidence of the planned cathedral unbuilt at Lutyens’s death in 1944 — was used as a foundation for the circular modern cathedral, which supports a 21-metre high lantern tower of stained glass. Even more impressive is the view from the top of the Anglican Cathedral. You can see the whole city the Mersey the Wirral peninsula and, faint against the horizon, the mountains of North Wales, while cargo ships and ferries pass to and from the Irish Sea. The view drew us down to the Pier Head, which is best seen in the evening when the sun sets across the Wirral and turns the cream facades golden. Three buildings dominate the waterfront, though the Royal Liver Building with its l8ft-tall statues of the mythical Liver bird on top, is the most famous.

Along with the Mersey D0Git3 aud flai-buui Buai-d offices and the Cunard building it seems more Chicago or New York than Merseyside, but taking a round-trip on the ferry across the Mersey we could see why They are large enough to welcome in and wave goodbye to transatlantic ships, one bookend to the journey with New York the other. This waterfront also has Liverpool’s other great draw: the Albert Dock, attracting five million visitors each year to the Tate Gallery the Beatles Museum and the Museum of Maritime Life. This last is the most impressive, with an excellent slavery exhibition in the basement, proving nearly as popular with children as the Titanic ship model upstairs (the exhibition recreates the awful conditions slaves and emigrants endured on their journey to the New World). UT most of the time we wandered the ~treet~ looking at 1) museums, galleries, coffee bars pavement cafes, newly converted warehouse flats — one thing Liverpool isn’t short of is warehouses — and bars and restaurants to serve them. It makes you wonder why all you ever hear about is the Beatles. An evening in the ‘new” Cavern Club won’t be enough to get us back to Liverpool (the old club was demolished in the 1970s), but a really good hotel would be. Whether it’s the planned Beatles-themed Hard Day’s Night remains to be seen.

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