I remember my first ever visit to John Bright Street as a teenager, stepping foot in Edwards No. 8 to headbang in a circle with strangers - thus changing the course of my life for the better, forever.
Here in 2026, my visits are far less frequent. While the road is great for Cherry Reds breakfast and beers, Turtle Bay brunch and cocktails and Caribbean and Cocktails for Caribbean cuisine and cocktails, the stretch closer to the theatre bridge is graffiti-marred and a bit grim.
But this week I visited on a pretty spring day, my chin turned upwards to the sun to immerse myself in a whole new Birmingham. Well, a whole old Birmingham.
There were two reasons I was visiting, and neither involved pre-12pm mixed drinks. The first was to get a better understanding of what it all might look like if this planning application is granted and a seven-storey hotel takes over the old Borough Buildings. The second was to drink in all of the splendour of the neighbourhood that Villa rivals Bologna took the time to celebrate in this beautiful video showing Birmingham in the best possible light.
Like so much of the city, it's a road so many of us take for granted, its historic frontages and rich backstories largely forgotten by those who rush past en route to the train station after a night at the Alexandra Theatre. On ground level, it's all graffiti scrawls and frontages. Skywards, it's full of precious memories, many of them locked away behind hoarding.
Caribbean and Cocktails is keeping people frequenting the site of the old Futurist Cinema which, back in 1919 when it opened, became one of the very first places to show 'talkies' - films with sound - in the city. The building was given Grade II-listed status last year, protecting it for the future. In its life, it survived the Luftwaffe, was the site of a shisha lounge and a strip club and now, in the sun, is a special reminder of our ever-depleting film history. Most people will visit and never know its importance.
Right opposite, the old Birmingham Skin Hospital has been sitting empty since 2014 when Rosie O'Briens nightclub moved out. It was built in 1887 by James and Lister, the architectural firm behind some of our most famous boozers: the Bartons Arms in Newtown, the Red Lion over on Soho Road, the Woodman in Digbeth and the British Oak in Stirchley among them. It's currently up for sale for £1.5m and it's got full planning permission and listed building consent to transform it into 15 luxury apartments, so more on that as we get it.
The potential new hotel I was in the neighbourhood to peep at isn't in a listed building; it was built as a car showroom in 1909, later being used as the Ikon Gallery and a carpet shop before closing up. It's hard to see what makes the Borough Building special as it stands today; aside from graffiti writers throwing up tags, there's little to enjoy.
I'm not an idiot; I've seen my fair share of planning applications go in just to watch nothing ever happen to them, the buildings and lands sold on for a little bit more money given the paperwork that goes with it. There's nothing to say this will happen at the Borough buildings though, and reading through the extensive planning application I'm hopeful that it'll come to fruition.
If it does, it'll be a welcome boost for John Bright Street, still not at full brightness, even in the spring sun. Imagine strolling down here in a few years, locals leaving their old hospital apartments to pop in to the cafe that sits on the bottom floor of the brand new snazzy hotel before heading off to a show at the Alexandra? Wilder to imagine... that they go to watch a film at the Futurist...? The more cocktails I drink over Caribbean food, the more I start to believe it could happen.
