Where to Stay in Birmingham, England

What is Birmingham known for?

Birmingham is known as the second-largest city in Britain and the heart of the West Midlands, a place of trades and workshops. In the Victorian age it was called the City of a Thousand Trades and the Workshop of the World. St Martin in the Bull Ring marks the old market at its centre, and the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery holds its collections.

Industry made it. The city still carries the mark of the crafts that built Birmingham.

What are the main landmarks in Birmingham?

Birmingham's landmarks trace its trades. St Martin in the Bull Ring stands over the old market at the centre, and the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery and the Barber Institute of Fine Arts hold the city's collections. The Thinktank science museum and the Pen Museum record its industry.

Aston Hall and Soho House survive from earlier centuries in the northern quarters. The Birmingham Back to Backs preserve old workers' housing, while the Wheel of Birmingham turns above the modern centre.

What is the history of Birmingham?

Birmingham began as a small settlement and grew into the workshop of a nation. A market town in the Middle Ages around St Martin in the Bull Ring, it turned to metal trades early, and by the Victorian age it had earned the names City of a Thousand Trades and Workshop of the World. Small makers filled it.

Iron and brass shaped it. Where guns, pens, buttons, and jewellery were made in countless small shops, the town spread outward across the West Midlands into a great manufacturing city. Great houses and institutions rose with the wealth of the trades.

Soho House was home to a leading manufacturer, and Aston Hall stood in its park to the north. The Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery and the Barber Institute of Fine Arts gathered art for the growing city, while the Pen Museum and the Thinktank later recorded the industries that built it. Rows of the Birmingham Back to Backs housed the workers who kept the trades going.

Canals laced the whole place together. Birmingham grew into the second city of the United Kingdom, at the centre of the West Midlands conurbation. The workshops are fewer now.

The city still lives from the making that raised it.

Where is Birmingham?

Birmingham lies in the West Midlands of England, an inland city set on a low plateau away from any coast. It stands at the centre of the West Midlands conurbation, with the Black Country on its west side and the towns of Solihull and Sutton Coldfield close around it. Coventry lies to the east across the Meriden Gap, and Lichfield to the north. The ground is gently rolling.

Canals cross the plateau that Birmingham grew upon.

What is the climate of Birmingham?

Birmingham has a cool, damp inland climate, far from the softening reach of the sea. Winters are grey and chilly, with frost and long spells of cloud settling over the plateau where the city and the wider West Midlands stand. Summers are mild and changeable.

Rain falls through much of the year, and the weather turns often over the low ground around the city.

How do you get to Birmingham?

Birmingham sits at the centre of England's rail and road network, easy to reach from every direction. Trains run in from London and the north to the stations in the centre, and motorways ring the city and link it to the wider West Midlands and the Black Country beyond. Roads meet here from all sides.

From the central stations it is a short walk to St Martin in the Bull Ring and the markets at the heart of Birmingham.