Invisible Cities offers tours run by people who have experienced homelessness. For dad-of-two Andy it’s been life-changing – and his clients love it too.
It’s a city of famous landmarks, from the stunning Central Library to the neo-gothic Town Hall, Old Trafford to the Etihad, the Chinatown archway to the rising skyscrapers of ‘Manc-hattan’. But even if you own an original 1989 bucket hat, Manchester tour guide Andy has something to show you.
From tales about the city’s quirky Tommy Ducks pub – where bras and knickers were once pinned to the ceiling, and glass-topped coffins were used as tables – or to hear what happened when celebrity medium Derek Acorah encountered spirits as lairy as the Gallagher brothers, Andy is your guide.
Like all the tour guides who work for Invisible Cities in Manchester, Glasgow, Aberdeen, York, Cardiff, Edinburgh and Liverpool and have been affected by homelessness, Andy has a unique perspective of the city he lives in – shaped by his experience of living in a garage in Greater Manchester. Meanwhile Gordon Brown blasts the return of ‘poverty of 60 years ago’ as he makes one big demand.
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“I had a group of nurses over from Massachusetts last week,” Andy says, as he takes another tour through secret passageways and hidden cut-throughs. “I was able to show them the oldest and best pubs in Manchester and a bit about how people live. Hopefully they experienced something really different.” Founded in 2016, Invisible Cities aims to “challenge perceptions of homelessness and provide meaningful opportunities for people to share their experiences and knowledge through unique walking tours”.
Over the last few weeks, the Oasis faithful have been led by fellow fan Nic, on a ‘Wonderwalk’ through the city that inspired anthems like Don’t Look Back in Anger, visiting iconic spots such as the Free Trade Hall, Microdot, and Afflecks Palace. In Glasgow, tourists get to see the streets from the perspective of people like Brian – who spent 30 years battling addictions and homelessness before rebuilding his life.
In Aberdeen, mum-of-three Michelle leads tourists into The Silver City’s Shadows where people like her struggle to find a safe home. In York, Miles – a former banker who found his life turned upside down by addiction and homelessness – peels away the layers of local history.
These are just some of 158 trained guides, covering tours from ‘The Real Women of Edinburgh’ to ‘York’s Railway Heritage’ to a poetry and protest tour of Cardiff that ends at the feet of the founder of the NHS, Aneurin Bevan. Invisible Cities’ founder, Zakia Moulaoui Guery, set up the project after experiencing something similar on a trip to Athens. “I wanted to bring homelessness out of the shadows,” she says. “Our goal is simple: to replace stigma with understanding, and stereotypes with human connection.”
For Andy it’s been life-changing. “It’s given me purpose, a future, at a time when everything seemed to have gone,” he says. Andy is happy to share his own story with the people he guides around the city too. In 2014, his marriage ended, forcing him to leave the social housing he’d shared for a decade with his ex-wife and two children.
He’d been a full-time carer for his son who has cerebral palsy so hadn’t been in paid employment for a while, making it even harder to start again. Deemed a low priority for council help – he was told he faced a wait of five years to be housed – he suddenly found himself homeless. “You don’t think it can happen to you,” he says, shaking his head, “Not at 47. I’d had a family and a stable home then suddenly it all went. I literally had nowhere to go, I was facing having to sleep on the streets, I didn’t know if I could hack it, but what else could I do?”
Someone from Andy’s church in Wigan, Lancs, offered him a place to sleep – in their garage. “I thought it would be for a week or so, while I looked for a private rented property,” he says, “But with all the paperwork it took three months. I was stuck in a catch 22, the benefits people said I needed an address to get Job Seekers’ Allowance and to have it paid into a bank, but I didn’t have an address.
“They told me to keep quiet about being homeless if I went for an interview, I didn’t know how that would work…” While flat and job hunting, Andy threw himself into volunteering. A placement at the Manchester Museum saw him start to find himself again. He learned fast, working with the public and in other museums.
When he heard about Invisible Cities, he felt confident enough to sign up. “I decided to give it a go,” he explains, “I was nervous but when you’re on your a**e you realise you’ve got nothing to lose.” Andy used lockdown to prepare his tour and joined the team in 2021. Now he gives three or four tours a month. “I realised I had knowledge I could share, of the city centre, of its history and pubs and like the other guides, of my own life,” he says. “It feels more important than ever to do that. Until you’ve experienced homelessness it’s hard to understand how isolated you feel.
“But no-one is immune. Things like bereavement, being switched to Universal Credit, relationships not working, it happens. When I got my own place and put the key in the door, that feeling of safety came back. Most of the time homelessness is invisible, people are sofa surfing, or staying in these hotels or B&Bs. You feel left out of society. This is about showing we’re human, we’re still here, it can happen to anyone.”
Invisible Cities isn’t just for tourists, but for locals too. Manchester is the Mirror’s Claire Donnelly’s home city but she says Andy opened her eyes to new parts of the city and gave her a different vantage point from which to view a place she’s known all her life. Andy, she says, had her laughing out loud with some of his stories. “He’s fun, easy company with a great line in unusual local history, including the lady drinkers pinning their knickers to the wall,” she says.
“Manchester is my home city but thanks to Andy I’ve noticed things that have previously passed me by. Tiny, tucked away pubs, historical monuments, secret tunnels – including one from a church altar to a pub down the road – and some of the quiet spaces homeless people use.”
The Tommy Ducks pub is now a Premier Inn, but in St Ann’s Square, a place Claire says she passes through all the time, Andy points out a striking artwork – ‘Jesus the Homeless,’ a bronze depiction of Christ as a homeless man, sleeping on a bench. “It’s one of several dotted across the world, but I must have walked by here thousands of times without noticing it,” Claire says.
Andy smiles. “And that’s why we do this,” he says, “To show you all the things people never see. And to show that anyone – including people who have been homeless – are capable of doing anything, of contributing.”