3 min readA bustling series of stallholders, live music and plenty of refreshments – that is the format of the much-loved Levenshulme Market, returning for 2020 on Saturday 7 March (10am-4pm) to Levenshulme Train Station car park. Following on from recently being crowned the UK’s ‘Best Small Outdoor Market’ at the Great British Market Awards, Levenshulme Market is set to be more exciting than ever and highly-anticipated, following its usual Winter break.
It certainly is a market worth celebrating – one of the few social enterprises of its kind, community-run and operating this way for seven impressive years! It combines this social ethos with an array of unique traders and opportunities, with the Saturday 7 March market offering over 45 stalls featuring street food, crafts, artwork, fashion, jewellery, homewares and more. Announced stallholders (all can be seen on the website) include DevilDog Sauces with their small batch Manchester-made hot sauces, handcrafted acrylic and clay jewellery from MushyPeaDesign and Inspiré Cosmetics with handmade, biodegradable products.
This first market of the year will be welcoming back a range of regular stallholders as well as traders who are brand new; including street food stall Meksikan, Slurp, Crackle & Pop, Urban Presever and VinoBuono. That means wine on tap – as VinoBuono offer a range of wines in this way, which people can buy by the bottle, or bring their own container to be filled up.
Other highlights include the opportunity for free ice-cream; as to celebrate their tenth birthday, Manchester-based Ginger’s Comfort Emporium have created over 750 special scratch cards and will be coming to the market with a limited number! Get lucky with one to be in with the chance of winning delicious delights including a free scoops, double-scoops and more.
Ginger’s Comfort Emporium have been a much-loved feature of many past markets and other returning traders for the first of the year include Winter Tarn Cheese, Reddy Lane Market Garden and Coffee Cranks Cooperative: locally-based and proud.
Putting the local community and its creatives at the heart of proceedings, is something that matters to Levenshulme Market; set up as a CIC (Community Interest Company) seeking to be responsive to local people. According to its mission statement, as viewable on the website here, its aims include operating in a sustainable way, continuing to be independent - and involving plenty of fun too! That certainly can be expected with their feature of live music for the 7 March, as the band Ideal Forgery will be providing tunes, following on from sell-out gigs at the likes of The Deaf Institute, Manchester Academy and more.
Levenshulme Market is also known for its innovative format – not only taking place most Saturdays from March to December – but once a month there is typically an exciting Friday Night Market taking place in the same location but at 5-9pm, with the next being on Friday 20 March; marking a 7th birthday celebration for the market too! Levenshulme Market also pops-up every Tuesday at the University of Manchester and for more information and all the dates, visit the website.
The full line-up for the 7 March market can be found on www.levymarket.com and the Market’s Facebook page.
By Emily Oldfield
