Birmingham (population 1.1 million city, 2.9 million metropolitan area — the second-largest city in the United Kingdom and the largest city in England outside London) is the city that industrialized the world: the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution (the Lunar Society of Birmingham (1765–1813) — the most important intellectual society in British history: the fortnightly dinner meetings of James Watt (the inventor of the steam engine — the most important single invention in human history), Matthew Boulton (the manufacturer who commercialized Watt's steam engine at the Soho Manufactory — the first modern factory), Joseph Priestley (the discoverer of oxygen (1774)), Erasmus Darwin (Charles Darwin's grandfather and the first scientist to propose the theory of evolution), Josiah Wedgwood (the master potter and the inventor of mass production in ceramics) and twelve other members who between them transformed the way the world manufactures, thinks and organizes society), the city that coined the word "million" for a new kind of wealth (the Birmingham industrialists were the first to become millionaires in the modern sense), and now one of the most ethnically diverse and culinarily exciting cities in Europe (the city with the most Michelin-starred restaurants per capita outside London, the largest concentration of Balti restaurants in the world (the "Balti Triangle" — the 50+ Balti restaurants of Sparkbrook, Moseley and Balsall Heath where the Balti (the Urdu/Punjabi steel wok curry) was invented by the Pakistani restaurant owners of Birmingham in the 1970s) and the biggest St Patrick's Day parade outside Dublin and New York).
Jewellery Quarter (the most important jewellery manufacturing district in the UK and one of the most important in the world — 700 businesses, 6,000 workers and over 40% of all jewellery manufactured in the UK in one square mile of Victorian red-brick streets in northwest Birmingham): the Museum of the Jewellery Quarter (the Smith & Pepper jewellery factory — the most important industrial heritage site in Birmingham: the factory that operated from 1899 to 1981 without significant alteration and was then preserved exactly as it was on the day it closed: the museum takes visitors through the complete jewellery manufacturing process from the raw gold alloy (the "alloy" — the mixing of the pure gold with the copper and silver to produce the 9-carat, 14-carat and 18-carat gold alloys used in jewellery) to the finished piece: the manufacturing techniques (the die-stamping, the casting, the soldering, the polishing and the setting of stones) have not changed in their fundamental nature since the late 19th century: the most complete Victorian jewellery workshop experience in the world.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideBarber Institute of Fine Arts (the most underrated art museum in the UK — the private gallery at the University of Birmingham, opened 1939, designed by the architect Robert Atkinson in the Art Deco style): the collection (the most concentrated and most consistently excellent small Old Master collection in Britain outside the National Gallery and the Wallace Collection: the 40 galleries): the highlights include: a Rubens portrait (the Peter Paul Rubens workshop portrait of the Archduke Albert — the Spanish Habsburg governor of the Spanish Netherlands), the Thomas Gainsborough portrait (the most important Gainsborough portrait outside the Kenwood House and the National Portrait Gallery), the J.M.W. Turner watercolor (the most important Turner in the Midlands: the atmospheric coastal watercolor), the Édouard Manet "Le Repos" (the seated figure of Berthe Morisot — the most important Manet in the Midlands), the Edgar Degas bronze sculpture (the most important Degas sculpture outside London), and the Vincent van Gogh "Man Drinking" (the most important Van Gogh in the Midlands: the 1888 oil of the Arles café scene). Free entry.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideDigbeth (the most bohemian neighborhood in Birmingham — the "Brooklyn of Birmingham"): the Custard Factory (the former Bird's Custard factory — the most important creative industry cluster in the Midlands: Alfred Bird invented powdered custard in Birmingham in 1837 (because his wife was allergic to eggs and traditional custard required eggs) — the Bird's Custard factory complex was converted in the 1990s into the most important creative industries hub outside London: 200+ creative businesses (design agencies, film production companies, music studios, galleries and independent restaurants)): the Digbeth Mural Fest (the annual street art festival that has made Digbeth the most important street art destination in the UK outside London: the murals of the Digbeth back streets — the most important outdoor gallery in the Midlands: the Birmingham street art circuit covers the Back-to-Backs, the Custard Factory walls and the railway arches of the Grand Central Birmingham area).
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideBirmingham Balti Triangle (the most important curry district in the UK and the birthplace of the Balti — the most specifically British of all Indian restaurant innovations): the Balti (from the Urdu "balt" — the bucket or the wok: the thin pressed steel vessel that was the defining innovation of the Birmingham Pakistani restaurant owners): the history of the Balti: the Pakistani restaurant owners of Sparkbrook (the most densely Pakistani-populated neighborhood in Birmingham) in the late 1970s began cooking and serving curry in the thin pressed steel wok ("balti dish") directly from the hob to the table: the dish arrived at the table still sizzling in the steel wok, without a separate plate: the Balti is faster to cook (the thin steel conducts heat extremely rapidly), hotter when it arrives at the table, and cheaper to produce than the traditional ceramic-dish Indian restaurant curry: the Birmingham Balti became the most important British-Asian food innovation of the late 20th century and inspired the "Balti curry" genre that spread from Birmingham throughout the UK restaurant industry in the 1980s and 1990s: the three "great" Balti restaurants of the Triangle: Al Frash (the most awarded Balti restaurant in Birmingham), Shabab (the longest-established: opened 1974), and Adil's (the restaurant that claims to have invented the Balti dish service in the first place).
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideCadbury World (the most popular paying visitor attraction in the West Midlands — 600,000 visitors per year): the immersive chocolate factory experience at the home of Cadbury in Bournville: the history of chocolate from the Aztec cacao drink (the Nahuatl "xocolatl" — the fermented and roasted cacao bean drink of the Aztec elite: a bitter, spiced, sometimes alcohol-fermented drink consumed cold: the Aztec use of cacao as a currency (the cacao bean was used as money in the Aztec Empire — the "pecunia" (money) of the Aztec economy)): to the Spanish introduction of chocolate to Europe (Hernán Cortés brought cacao to Spain in 1528 and the Spanish court added sugar and drank it hot: the most important step in the transformation of the Aztec bitter drink into the European sweet beverage): to the Cadbury family (the Birmingham Quaker family who became the most important chocolate manufacturers in Britain: John Cadbury opened the first Cadbury shop in Birmingham in 1824 (selling tea, coffee and chocolate): the Bournville factory (1879) was the first chocolate factory in the world to offer systematic welfare provisions for the workers: the 8-hour working day, the pension, the medical care and the sports facilities — 40 years before the UK government legislated any of these as rights).
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideBlack Country Living Museum (the most important open-air industrial museum in Britain — 26 hectares of the actual Victorian industrial landscape of Dudley, West Midlands): the recreated 1930s Black Country village (the "Black Country" — the area of the West Midlands west and north of Birmingham (Dudley, Sandwell, Wolverhampton and Walsall) where the combination of coal, limestone and iron ore deposits created the most intensely industrialized landscape in Britain: the "Black Country" name (from the persistent coal dust and smoke that darkened the sky and the buildings for 200 years of intensive coal and metal industry)): the village (the most authentic recreation of a 1930s Black Country industrial community in existence: the coal miner's cottage (the "back-to-back" terraced house — the most important domestic form of the Victorian industrial working class: two houses built back-to-back sharing a single rear wall, with no garden and no through-passage), the chainmaker's workshop (the Black Country was the world's most important chain manufacturing area from the early 19th century to the 1970s: the Dudley chainmakers produced the anchor chains for the Titanic, the anchor chain for the Great Eastern (Brunel's most important ship) and the chains for most of the naval vessels of the British Empire), the canal basin (the historic narrow boat canal system that was the primary transport infrastructure of the Industrial Revolution before the railways)).
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideBrindleyplace (the most important urban regeneration project in the UK outside London — the former industrial canal basin and warehouse district converted in the 1990s into the most successful mixed-use waterfront development in Britain): the Birmingham canal network (the most extraordinary fact about Birmingham: the city has more miles of canal within its city limits (35 miles (56km)) than Venice has (26 miles (42km)): the Birmingham canal network was built between 1769 and 1816 to connect the manufacturing workshops of the city to the national canal network (the most important transport infrastructure of the British Industrial Revolution before the railways)): the Gas Street Basin (the most important historic canal basin in Birmingham — the junction of the Birmingham Canal (1769: the canal opened by James Brindley (the most important canal engineer in history: Brindley built 365 miles of canal in his career)) with the Worcester & Birmingham Canal: the Gas Street Basin was the most important commercial waterway junction in the Midlands in the early 19th century): the waterfront restaurants and bars (the Ikon Gallery (the most important contemporary art gallery in Birmingham — the 1877 Gothic Revival building on Oozells Square converted into the most critically acclaimed public art gallery in the Midlands), the National Sea Life Centre and the restaurants of the Brindleyplace development).
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideBroad Street nightlife (the "Golden Mile" of Birmingham entertainment — the 1km stretch of Broad Street from Five Ways to the Gas Street Basin that is the most concentrated nightlife district in the English Midlands): the Broad Street bar and club scene (the most ethnically diverse nightlife district in the UK — the Birmingham nightlife reflects the city's extraordinary ethnic diversity (Birmingham is the most ethnically diverse large city in the UK: over 45% of the population is from a non-white British ethnic background — the most multicultural large city in Britain after London): the Broad Street bars serve everything from the Birmingham craft beer (the Burning Soul, the Dig Brew Co and the Two Towers craft breweries are the most important Birmingham craft brewers) to the Rum Shack cocktails (the Caribbean influence in the Broad Street bar scene reflects the large British-Caribbean community of the Birmingham Handsworth and Lozells neighborhoods — the Windrush generation (the West Indian migrants who came to Birmingham in the 1950s and 1960s under the British Nationality Act 1948) and their descendants are the most important influence on Birmingham music culture (the birthplace of UK Grime and the UK Drill music scene)).
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideBirmingham Museum & Art Gallery (the most important civic museum in England outside London — opened 1885 in the most extravagant Victorian civic Gothic building in the Midlands): the Pre-Raphaelite collection (the largest collection of Pre-Raphaelite art in the world — the movement founded in London in 1848 by William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais and Dante Gabriel Rossetti but adopted most enthusiastically by the Birmingham civic elite who became the most important patrons of the Pre-Raphaelite painters: the Edward Burne-Jones collection (Burne-Jones was born in Birmingham in 1833 and is the most important Pre-Raphaelite artist: the "Star of Bethlehem" (the most important work by Burne-Jones in Birmingham: the large oil-and-gold-leaf tempera panel), the tapestry cartoons and the stained glass designs are the most significant Pre-Raphaelite works in any civic collection in Britain)): the Round Room (the most spectacular Victorian civic interior in England: the circular domed gallery at the center of the museum — the original exhibition gallery built in 1885 for the Birmingham Municipal Art Gallery: the plaster ceiling, the painted friezes and the perfect circular form make the Round Room the most photographed interior in Birmingham).
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideSoho House Museum (the most important house in the history of science — the home of Matthew Boulton (1728–1809): the Birmingham entrepreneur and manufacturer who commercialized James Watt's steam engine at the Soho Manufactory (the world's first modern factory — opened 1775 on Handsworth Heath, 2km north of Birmingham city center): the Lunar Society of Birmingham (1765–1813) met at Soho House fortnightly on the Monday nearest the full moon ("by the light of the full moon" — the reason the society was named the "Lunar Society" (also: the "Lunatics" — the affectionate nickname the members gave themselves)): the 14 members of the Lunar Society included: James Watt (the steam engine inventor — the Boulton & Watt partnership at the Soho Manufactory built 500 steam engines between 1775 and 1800: the most important commercial partnership in the history of technology), Joseph Priestley (the discoverer of oxygen (1774), the inventor of carbonated water and the most important experimental chemist of the 18th century), Erasmus Darwin (the physician-poet who first proposed the theory of evolution in "Zoonomia" (1796) — 63 years before his grandson Charles Darwin published "On the Origin of Species"), and Josiah Wedgwood (the master potter who invented the mass production of ceramics and the modern marketing strategy (the "Royal Warrant" and the celebrity endorsement — Wedgwood sent free china to Queen Charlotte and the Empress Catherine the Great and then sold "in the style of Her Majesty's china" to the mass market)).
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideSelfridges Birmingham (the Bullring shopping center — the most important contemporary building in Birmingham and one of the most important pieces of commercial architecture in the UK): the Future Systems design (the architectural partnership of Jan Kaplický and Amanda Levete: the "blob" architecture of the late 1990s and early 2000s that challenged the straight lines and regular volumes of the previous architectural generation): the building (the 2003 curvilinear aluminum disc building — the "alien spaceship" or the "chainmail dress": the building's exterior is clad in 15,000 hand-fitted anodized aluminum discs (each disc approximately 60cm in diameter) that reflect the light in constantly changing patterns): the building transformed Birmingham's international reputation: the opening of the Selfridges Birmingham in September 2003 was the single most important event in the Birmingham urban regeneration story of the 2000s — the building that told the world that Birmingham had reinvented itself from the brutalist concrete city of the 1960s into a city of architectural ambition and cultural confidence.
🎫 Book tickets via GetYourGuideBirmingham Curry Mile farewell (the most diverse restaurant district in England — the Ladypool Road and Stoney Lane curry strip of Sparkbrook and Moseley: the "Balti Triangle" where the Balti was invented, surrounded by the most diverse range of South Asian cuisines in any city in Europe): the Balti (the thin-pressed-steel wok curry — the Birmingham invention that changed British food culture): the options: Balti chicken tikka (the most ordered Balti in Birmingham), Balti lamb karahi (the classic Balti with the whole spice tempering in the hot oil before the meat is added), Kashmiri lamb korma (the pale, creamy, nut-thickened curry of the Kashmiri Pandits — the most aromatic and most mildly spiced of the Birmingham curry house offerings), Punjabi tandoor (the clay oven cooking: the chicken tikka (the marinated chicken pieces cooked in the tandoor) and the naan bread (the leavened wheat flatbread baked against the inner wall of the tandoor at 400°C (750°F))), and the Bengali biryani (the most important biryani in Birmingham — the long-grain basmati rice cooked with the spiced lamb and the fried onion: the biryani of the Sylheti Bengali community (the most important Bangladeshi community in Birmingham: the Sylheti region of northeastern Bangladesh is the most important origin area for the Birmingham Bangladeshi community) is the most complex and most labor-intensive rice dish in the Birmingham culinary landscape).
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