From the outside, Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts looks like an impressive Georgian building…read morethat is home to important academics. In actual fact, it's an all singing, all dancing facility where students are encouraged to live out their Glee and Fame fantasies!
Built in 1825, the building was originally used as a school for boys with past students including Paul McCartney and George Harrison. Hearing the building was empty and neglected in the late eighties, McCartney joined forces with entepeneur and Brit School founder Mark Featherstone-Witty to regenerate and re-open the building as a higher education facility for creatives. After a seven year struggle and mulit-million pound investment, the doors open in 1996 offering students diplomas, degrees and post-graduate programmes in everything from Performing Arts, Music, Dance and Sound Technology to Entertainment Management and Theatre and Performance Design.
I've never studied at LIPA personally but if I was in my teens, I might aspire to. Alongside regular classes, there are masterclasses and Q&A sessions with industry veterans and musicians. Previous guests have included Trevor Horn, Malcolm McClaren, Antony H. Wilson, Alan McGee, Cathy Dennis and Will Young.