Creator, Creative Director, Producer, Playwright, Performer and Blue Badge Tourist Guide
Nakib Narat is a creative producer, playwright, performer, researcher and qualified Blue Badge Tourist Guide for the UK and Ireland. His work explores place, belonging, participation and public memory.
The idea for Mancunianity Flows developed over two years through Nakib's artistic practice and extensive work with older people across Greater Manchester. Nakib founded and led the public engagement and creative development of the project with local residents and a supportive creative team.
Read more about Nakib's creative career
Mancunianity Flows is Nakib's second Arts Council England-supported award. His first supported Ellen's Longest Night, a professional theatre production about Manchester, was created in collaboration with local communities.
Nakib originated and co-produced The Manchester Passion 2017, developed the script and performed Pontius Pilate for an audience of around 5,000 in Cathedral Gardens, with a team of local artists and volunteers.
Before becoming a full-time actor, Nakib worked as a Granada Television journalist alongside Tony Wilson. Nakib later became a community producer with Aviva Studios, helped create a series of participatory projects and continued to work in theatre, oral history and public culture.
Creative team
Artists shaping sound, music and performance
Dr Simon Knighton
Audio Associate, Composer and Sound Artist
Simon Knighton is an Ivor Novello-nominated composer and recipient of the Royal Musical Association's Tippett Medal. Based in Manchester, Simon completed a PhD at the Royal Northern College of Music.
Working with acoustic instruments, electronics and field recordings, Simon is creating the sound world carried through the wireless headphones. His role includes recording, editing and shaping the layered city soundscape.
Portrait: Fiona Brehony.
Jules Gibb
Musician, Artist and Guide
Jules Gibb has more than 20 years' experience working with adult and junior community choirs and leading projects in theatres, schools and concert halls.
Jules supports the workshops, develops music with the Weavers and helps turn the new project song into a chorus audiences can join. No audition, musical training or previous singing experience is needed.
Andy Barry
Contributing Theatre Practitioner
Andy Barry is a nationally respected theatre director and creative-ageing specialist who founded and led the Royal Exchange Theatre's Elders Company from 2014 to 2024. His work has long connected theatre practice with the lived experience of older people.
Andy is leading two focused workshops. Through gathering, listening, movement and stillness, he will help the Weavers develop as a theatrical ensemble and refine their parts within the public experience.
Co-creators at the heart of the project
Meet the Weavers
Local Weavers are helping shape Mancunianity Flows through conversation, field visits, creative workshops, research, music, memories and close observation of the River Irwell.
The Weavers are not simply being asked to remember the past. They are helping question the history, explore the landscape, test ideas and influence the stories, sounds, music and public moments that shape the experience.
Many ways to contribute
Memories, questions, observations, recordings, rhythms, fact-checks and audience prompts can all become part of the work.
Choice comes first
No Weaver must perform, share private experiences, be recorded or appear in a photograph. Every public contribution is agreed and reviewed.
Co-creation, not consultation
The Weavers influence what audiences hear, notice, discuss and remember.
The current Weavers
Jacqueline Corr - Weaver
Portrait supplied for Mancunianity Flows by Nakib Narat.
Biography to follow.
Dorretta Maynard - Weaver
Portrait supplied for Mancunianity Flows by Nakib Narat.
Biography to follow.
Tony Easom - Weaver
Portrait supplied for Mancunianity Flows by Nakib Narat.
Tony Easom is a Salford artist, folk musician and songwriter, a member of Salford Art Club and a former ship’s plumber. His memories of ships, tugs and locomotives around the River Irwell, the docks and the Manchester Ship Canal bring a distinctive working-life perspective to Mancunianity Flows.
Tony later worked at Manchester Dry Docks and on major industrial projects. Alongside that working life, he has continued to paint, photograph, perform and write songs rooted in people, place and public memory.
Among Tony’s earlier works is The Flag, also known as Who’ll Carry This Flag, which honours Jimmy Murphy. For Mancunianity Flows, Tony’s original words and music provide the foundations of a new River Irwell song. The material is being developed collaboratively through ten professionally led workshops at Aviva Studios, home of Factory International, involving Tony, the other Weavers, directors and musicians.
Who’ll Carry This Flag?, Tony Easom’s large-scale banner artwork, displayed inside a football stadium. Photograph: Tony Easom.
Catherine Maffia - Weaver
Portrait supplied for Mancunianity Flows by Nakib Narat.
Cath Maffia arrived in Manchester in 1968 to train as a nurse and now lives in Prestwich. Although not Mancunian by birth, she spent more than 30 years working across Salford as a Health Visitor, getting to know the city and developing a deep affection for its people, their resilience, warmth and community spirit.
For the past 25 years, Cath has worked and volunteered with refugees and asylum seekers, first professionally in Salford and later through voluntary organisations in Manchester. She witnessed many examples of welcome and neighbourliness, including one memorable story of an Afghan family settling in Salford. Facing initial hostility from some neighbours, the family's resourceful father bought a pack of Christmas cards, wrote "Happy Christmas from your Afghan neighbours" and delivered them door to door. The gesture transformed attitudes and brought an immediate end to the tensions.
Through her work, Cath has seen how small acts of kindness and understanding can strengthen communities and create lasting connections between people from very different backgrounds.
Tim Ward - Weaver
Portrait supplied for Mancunianity Flows by Nakib Narat.
Biography to follow.
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Bernard Sudlow - Weaver
Portrait to follow.
Biography to follow.
Ann Sarge - Weaver
Portrait supplied for Mancunianity Flows by Nakib Narat.
I was born in this magnificent city, Manchester. My father came from Nigeria. He was a Merchant Seaman and many of the Ocean Liners he worked on went to Salford Docks. Once a month he would receive a barrel from Nigeria which contained non-perishable foods. Cargo boats would sail down the River Irwell to Salford Docks and we would go to pick up the barrel. I was always so excited by the size of the Ocean Liners and the hustle and bustle of the Docks. I feel so proud that my father is part of Salford's amazing history.
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Maggie Haggas - Weaver
Portrait to follow.
Biography to follow.
Concept, research, creative direction and editorial design: Nakib Narat. Illustration created for Mancunianity Flows.
A growing community archive: approved Weaver stories, memories, photographs and recordings can be added over time alongside the project's illustrated and environmental content.
Our workshop home
Making Mancunianity Flows in The Lab
The Weavers and artists meet in The Lab at Aviva Studios, a rehearsal space with views across the courtyard towards historic warehouse buildings and the former Granada Television site.
Coronation Street was produced at Granada's Quay Street complex for more than 50 years. The setting also has a personal connection for project creator Nakib Narat, who appeared on programmes produced there.
Aviva Studios. Photograph by Marco Cappelletti, courtesy of OMA and Factory International.
