FAC 101 Tony Wilson's Lofts is a memorable undone Factory Records concept from the pioneering early days of the Eighties. He drew on his experience of New York City to try to convince the authorities in Manchester that they would be a viable proposition but they didn't buy it.

AHW explained thus: "We were visionary in that sense, that lofts would come one day. But we ran out of money - we were too busy with clubs and bars. We tried to explain lofts to people in Manchester and nobody understood it. We actually walked the Manchester Development corporation around a building in Sackville Street, which became lofts ten years later, and said 'These would make great lofts' and they went 'What are lofts?'"

It was thought that was nothing in writing in the public domain to document this FAC number. Well that was true until the discovery in amongst AHW's personal archive papers in the collection of the Museum of Science and Industry (MSI) of a briefing paper from a chap called 'Ken' (more info needed on who this is) where he sets out "a few initial notes for FAC 101" and includes a generic schematic of a typical loft.



Ken sets out the basic principle of what lofts are and concludes: "The development of the loft conversion is obviously in its initial stages in this country and will require a good deal of commitment on the part of local government and developers if it is to become a reality."

Eventually the commitment would come to light and now loft-type apartments are everywhere and not just in Manchester.

The full transcript of the 101 notes is on our sister site factoryrecords.org.

Labels: back_in_the_cellar, concept, Manchester, MSI, Tony_Wilson

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