TNF Opens Manchester Store

We're just back from the opening of the new The North Face concept store on Manchester's Deansgate where we enjoyed an audience with Mick Fowler, a Nepali breakfast and a look round the new store. That's it, up there...

The biggest TNF only shop in Europe - there are seven apparently - the new store is the second in the UK following on from the success of the Covent Garden TNF shop. It's big, bright and airy and one of the few places where you can find pretty much the entire North Face range under one roof. There's everything from sleeping bags, through clothing and packs and ontotents and footwear with some of the latest autumn / winter kit like TNF's new baselayers in stock now.

We don't pretend to understand design - as you've no doubt noticed - but we can tell you that the Italian design firm Brombini and Saccardo worked on the two-storey space creating, erm, 'a world-class destination for outdoor enthusiasts and retail shoppers' with a Tibetan theme and very nice it is too.

Potentially more interesting, but as yet unfinished, is a fully functioning indoor 7-metre ice-climbing wall, similar to the one in Covent Garden. Apparently its the tallest ice wall in a retail environment in the UK and is as high as the inside space of the building. Once it's open, customers will be able to rope up, don crampons and front point to their heart's content under the supervision of qualified instructors.

TNF is growing fast in the UK and Keith Byrne, the brand's UK marketing manager, hopes that the new store will also appeal to the kind of people who wouldn't venture into a pure outdoors shop as well as outdoor enthusiasts like you and me.

What more can we tell you? It's a nice shop, it's at 130-136 Deansgate, right in the centre of Manchester and it's open now. Phone number is 0870 428 4429. So there you go :-)

More TNF info - www.thenorthface.com