53 Two, Manchester

The furniture in the front windows of 53 Two make it look like an outreach centre, but this is in fact a very long bar located in one of the arches under Manchester Central. There are some alcoves off the main flagstone and concrete floored tunnel and the serving counter is located at the rear where there’s also a piano. Four Brightside lagers are doubled up across eight fonts, I went for the Helles which was OK, but at £3.10 for a half a bit pricey. There was a work Christmas function in progress so there was a good atmosphere with some Christmas hits playing in the background. The service was friendly, but this isn’t the cosiest of places so I’ll probably not return.

Selling itself as an "Arts & Performance" space this is a bar in an arch under Manchester Central. It's effectively a long, thin tunnel with a bar on the right and a couple of alcoves . There's also a piano with a sign on it that advertises "Pianaoke". Through a door into the next arch (not visited) is another area where a comedy night was being advertised later in the week. On the bar are 4 craft keg beers from Brightside Brewery, so I'm guessing that Carley Friedrich at Brightside may well have something to do with here. The pub dog is a whippet which is also unusual. Worth a visit if you like to try somewhere different.

53 Two opened in May and is situated in the Grade 2 listed final arch at the bottom of Watson Street,with the name being derived from the bar's geographical position. The bar has been opened by an Independent theatre group and although just a bar at the moment they hope to open the adjacent arch into a 150 seater theatre.The room is very long with a cosy alcove on the right complete with a mini library.The bar follows this and beyond this is a baby grand piano. An interesting feature of the bar is the over 100 boat shuttles inlayed into the concrete walkway with quite a few of the shuttles still with cotton attached and could represent the canal boats that used to carry the cotton away in the 18th and 19th centuries. There were 8 beer taps on show although one was doubled up.The staff were very helpful and informative and if you are near Deansgate it is definitely worth a visit. The opening hours are 11am till 1am