Top London bar Simmons arrives in Manchester with the city's 'best' Happy Hour and 'dancefloor vibes' until 4am

A quirky new bar open until 4am at weekends featuring the city’s ‘best Happy Hour’, live music and crispy pizza slices has opened its doors in the city centre.

Already known across London, Simmons has opened its first venue outside the capital in Deansgate today (October 24) full of glistening knick-knacks, Americana-themed decor and a karaoke booth fitted out to look like a music recording studio.

Situated in the former The Botanist site, Simmons is getting things off to a bang with two ‘free bar’ parties featuring some of Manchester’s best DJs and performers tonight and on Friday (October 25).

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Founded by CEO Nick Campbell back in 2013, Simmons now has more than 20 sites across London, including its original King’s Cross location. Proudly boasting its prominence for ‘cocktails, dreams and disco’, the new Manchester spot is no different.

At the centre of the venue is a striking party stage bearing a massive lighting bolt light installation and skull glitterball situated above the dancefloor, which is claimed to be the biggest in Deansgate. Over on the bar, there's also swinging chandelier lights that bar staff will activate throughout the night.

An expansive cocktail menu features the classics like the Spicy Margarita, Mojito, Long Island Iced Tea, and Zombie, as well as new, soon-to-be favourites including the Lychee Mar-Tea-Ni (served in a teacup) and a Gummy Bear, made up of vodka, melon liqueur, peach Schnapps and, of course, gummy bears.

Simmons also serves a range of £15 cocktail teapots, designed to share, and the team behind the bar have laid claim to the ‘best Happy Hour in the city’ - which runs from 4pm to 9pm on Sunday to Friday and includes 2-for-1 cocktails (starting from £9.20), £2.50 bottles of beer, and £2.50 spirit and mixers.

There is also the option to extend the Happy Hour offering, which also includes £3 glasses of wine, until midnight on the same days with the use of the Simmons mobile app. On Saturday, from 4pm to 9pm, there will be 2-for-1 cocktails and £15 cocktail teapots.

“We have always been ahead of the game in London,” Ollie Taylor, Simmons Sales and Marketing Director, tells the Manchester Evening News. “We’re always about providing value, we don’t charge door entry and we don’t think cheap is a dirty word. We want people to come out for a night out and not feel like they’ve broken the bank.

“Our Happy Hour is probably the best in the city, I believe so anyway. We’re pretty confident about that. It is cheap but it’s supposed to be for everybody. It’s so hard for young people to go out right now, and everyone is getting stretched, so we just want people to know that they can come here and not have to worry too much about the cost.”

Speaking about the choice for Simmons to open its first spot outside of London here in Manchester, Ollie says: “We’ve been opening bars in London for the best part of ten years now, so this isn’t just a small move for us.

“We’ve been wanting to expand for the next part of our journey, and there’s just something special about Manchester at the moment. I lived here for ten years, I’ve always loved the city.

“The hospitality here is through the roof. For us, we just want to be part of that so as soon as we got this venue, we were over the moon. Deansgate is an amazing location for us and we definitely feel like we can bring something to this part of Manchester that I don't think there really is right now.”

For the Manchester venue, there will be a big focus on live music - more so than in any of Simmons’ previous spots. The main stage will host local artists and bands, as well as DJs, from Thursday to Saturday, and will be open until 4am for those wanting to party late.

The karaoke booth, decked out like a recording studio, can be booked out for up to ten people with sessions starting at £50 per person and boasting more than 10,000 different songs to choose from. After exercising the vocal chords, there's also a photo booth to snap memories of the night.

“We want to be the place where the other bartenders in the city go after their shifts,” Ollie says. “We want to bring that kind of dance-floor feeling back to Manchester. We feel like the city is missing something like this.”

Of course, there will also be a hefty food menu on offer too until 10pm each night - with pizza, hot salted fries, garlic breadsticks and dips served up by Holy Slice, with a focus on New York-style crispy slices of pizza.

With slices starting from £3 each, there are a range of flavours on offer, including the Sweet Ricotta-Roni, featuring pepperoni, ricotta, hot honey and pecorino for £5 (with £1 going to the Mayor of Manchester’s ‘Bid for a Night’ homeless charity) and the Magic Mushroom (£3.50) featuring marinara, garlic and parsley mushrooms, and a NY cheese blend.

“If you go to New York, there is a whole movement and culture around proper, crispy pizza believing it shouldn’t be floppy,” Holy Slice's Andy Windsor says. “We’re trying to do that classic, bodega-style twists on your favourites. We’ve got a high hydration dough, which is our original recipe, which is double baked to be extra crispy.

“We’ve got some beautiful flavours that are just made to plunge and dip, our cheese sticks are wobbly garlic breads that are perfect to be dipped in marinara, and we’re serving up honey spiced fries and cookies. It’s super simple stuff, but made in-house and done right.”

Whilst the Manchester venue marks a new era for Simmons, the bar’s team are also already eyeing up further takeovers across the country.

“We’ve decided to really evolve from what we’ve done over the years and try new things here in terms of food, the partnership with Holy Slice, and live music,” Ollie adds. “And all of that has been really Manchester driven, it feels like part of the spirit here. Going forward, we want to do that in other parts of the country too. We feel like there are a lot of other opportunities to bring the party vibes."

Simmons is on 78 Deansgate, Manchester, M3 2FW. Open til 2am Tues-Thurs and Sunday, and until 4am on Friday and Saturday.