Birmingham

Birmingham's rise as a town began in 1166, when the lord of the manor, Peter de Bermingham, obtained a charter to hold a market at his castle and laid out a planned market town around it, on the site of today's Bull Ring. Its booming economy and high social mobility drew newcomers, and by 1700 it had grown fifteen-fold to become the fifth-largest town in England and Wales.

In the 18th century the town became a centre of the Midlands Enlightenment. The members of the Lunar Society met at Soho House, and Matthew Boulton opened his Soho Manufactory in 1765, then developed the industrial steam engine with James Watt in 1776. The town grew into a manufacturing centre of many trades, linked to the rest of the country by a dense network of canals. In 1855 Alexander Parkes invented the first man-made plastic in the Jewellery Quarter. A tradition of political radicalism, from Thomas Attwood to Joseph Chamberlain, mayor and later MP, gave the town a political influence unparalleled in Britain outside London.

The population peaked at about 1.1 million in 1951. The Birmingham Blitz of 1940 to 1943 left heavy damage, and post-war planners rebuilt the centre around a concrete Bull Ring and an inner ring road, destroying many Victorian buildings. In 1974 bombings in two city-centre pubs killed 21 people. From the 1990s the centre was remade again: Brindleyplace turned the canals into a destination, the Bullring was rebuilt in 2003, and the Library of Birmingham opened in 2013. The city hosted the Commonwealth Games in 2022, and in September 2023 the city council declared that it could not meet its financial commitments, effectively bankrupt after an equal pay claim.

Brummies are proud of an accent the rest of the country often mocks, and of a city that likes to call itself the second city of the United Kingdom. Birmingham's music runs from the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra in Symphony Hall to the heavy metal born in the city in the late 1960s and 1970s, when Black Sabbath, Judas Priest and half of Led Zeppelin came from here. The Birmingham Royal Ballet, the Repertory Theatre and the Hippodrome make it a major centre for the stage, and the Birmingham Museums Trust runs nine museums, among them historic houses such as Aston Hall and Soho House.

The city's population is highly diverse. The 2021 census found more than a quarter of residents born outside the UK and about 30 per cent Muslim, and the Vaisakhi Mela, the Bangla Mela and the Pride carnival in the Gay Village are among its biggest gatherings. Digbeth has long been the heart of the largest Irish community in mainland Britain. The Frankfurt Christmas Market, held since 2001, has become one of the largest outdoor Christmas markets in the country.

Sport has deep roots here. The Football League was founded in 1888 by William McGregor, a director of Aston Villa, and two of the country's oldest professional clubs, Villa and Birmingham City, still divide local loyalties. The modern game of lawn tennis was developed in Edgbaston between 1859 and 1865, and the Edgbaston cricket ground, where Brian Lara scored 501 not out in 1994, hosts Test matches. In June 2025 the World Crafts Council named Birmingham a World Craft City for its continuing jewellery trade.

About 1.2 million people lived in the city proper in 2024, making it the largest local authority in England, with 2.7 million in the urban area and about 4.3 million in the wider metropolitan area. It is one of the youngest cities in Europe, with a median age of 34. Neighbourhoods range from Sutton Coldfield in the north to the villas of Edgbaston, the inner-city districts of Sparkbrook, Small Heath and Handsworth and the outer council estates built when the back-to-back courts were cleared.

The economy has shifted from manufacturing to services, finance, law, universities and hospitals, among them the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, one of the largest teaching hospitals in the country. Making things still matters: Jaguar Land Rover builds cars at Castle Bromwich, Cadbury makes chocolate at Bournville, and some 300 independent firms in the Jewellery Quarter produce 40 per cent of the UK's jewellery. Yet unemployment is among the highest in the country, and Birmingham is the most deprived local authority in England by income and employment deprivation.

The council's financial crisis has meant cuts to local services. Transport is changing: tram lines are being extended, the Camp Hill railway line reopened in 2026, and the Curzon Street terminus of the HS2 high-speed line to London is under construction, though its first trains have been delayed beyond 2033.

The balti is Birmingham's dish: a curry cooked quickly over high heat in vegetable oil, in the manner of a stir-fry, with meat off the bone, and served in the thin pressed-steel bowl it was cooked in. Pakistani restaurateurs are credited with inventing it in Birmingham in the 1970s, and the area of Ladypool Road, Stoney Lane and Stratford Road, where some 50 balti houses clustered, became known as the Balti Triangle. A bid to protect "Birmingham Balti" under European rules failed because its variations could not be precisely defined.

The city's food brands are part of its industrial story. Cadbury's chocolate, Bird's Custard, Typhoo tea and HP Sauce all began in Birmingham, and Cadbury still makes chocolate in its model village at Bournville. The Bull Ring markets, descended from the market chartered in 1166, sell meat, fish and produce, and Chinatown's restaurants and supermarkets cluster around Hurst Street.

At the other end of the scale, Birmingham is the only city outside London with five Michelin-starred restaurants, spread between the city centre, Edgbaston and Moseley. The bars and restaurants of the Jewellery Quarter, Digbeth and Brindleyplace fill in the evenings, and the Christmas market adds German bratwurst and mulled Glühwein to the centre every winter.