Meet the Girl Gang celebrating female friendship, fun, and feminism in Manchester

For many people 2018 is the year of the woman and it’s the year of change. VIVA went to meet Girl Gang Manchester. A fluid collective of female artists, activists, academics, and party instigators who are celebrating women in Manchester and beyond.

The Girl Gang was set up in 2015 and follows a 10-point manifesto to help make a difference in Manchester. The manifesto outlines all of the aims of the Girl Gang, from wanting to create a community in the city to doing ‘rad shit that will change the world.’

VIVA sat down and had a coffee with Megan Griffith, the founder of Girl Gang Manchester. Megan has been there from the start of the Girl Gang journey which originally began in Sheffield.

She said: “Girl Gang Sheffield started by accident by my best friend Ellie”

The Girl Gang began after a coffee date between Ellie and a friend who at the time was releasing a Mean Girls inspired clothing range and wanted a launch event and screaning for the range. After the successful event Girl Gang Sheffield was formed.

Megan said: “We realised that women aren’t good at putting themselves out there and feel like they can’t create what they want to because other people are doing it and women don’t want to compete so we wanted to create a space that took all of that away.”

Girl Gang is not about competing and as stated in the manifesto ‘Her success is not your failure.’

After a year of Girl Gang Sheffield making positive changes, Megan, who lives in Manchester, decided that a space where women could actively encourage each other to promote their work and lift each other up was exactly what Manchester needed.

Since then Girl Gang has gone from strength to strength and has expanded organically to Leeds and Edinburgh spreading girl power vibes across the country.

All of the Girl Gang’s are run by friends of Megan and Ellie and the core team at the very centre of the idea is small meaning each event and activity that Girl Gang creates has a lot of love and attention put into it.

One of the most notable things Girl Gang Manchester does is create fun, inclusive events and club nights for everybody to come and enjoy.

Megan said: “We basically come together to put on an event serious that celebrates community, self-confidence, creativity, and brings people together to celebrate womanhood.

It’s all about having a good time and learning about everyday activism and feminism.”

Girl Gang is undoubtedly a fun collective, but it does like to act as a ‘gateway to feminism.’ The Girls are just as much about fun and friendship as they are politics and in the future plan to expand on this and become even more political and radical.

The events put on by Girl Gang Manchester, which include speed mating (yes that’s speed dating for making friends!), a Galentine’s Day Disco, and the up and coming Mother’s Day Disco, allow people to be celebrate friendship, make new friends and be open and authentic.

Girl Gang likes to facilitate friendship, for example at the Galentine’s Day Disco Megan was acting as a ‘friendship cupid’ who helped spread lady love all night.

She said “I was going around all night saying if there’s a girl that’s here tonight and you like her outfit or really like her moves tell me and I’ll go tell her on your behalf.”

The Speed Mating event especially allows people time to chat and find new friends and encourages people to open up and be authentic.

Speed Mating for most people may seem terrifying and awkward, and Girl Gang knows this but believes if you make a welcoming and accessible environment people can push themselves to do things they would never expect or would normally be too nervous to do.

Megan said: “We are really massive believers in the power of female friendship and the power, resilience, and strength that it can bring to every aspect of your life and I think that can’t be underestimated.”

Alongside the amazing club nights, Girl Gang also does film screenings, online campaigns, exhibitions, workshops, and they have even created a zine.

Megan said: “The idea of Girl Gang is that we can do anything.”

Last year Girl Gang Manchester collaborated with Girl Gang Sheffield to present the ‘#Seemyselfie’ campaign about self- representation, confidence, and portraiture.
The campaign took the act of taking a selfie and examined why people do it and how they feel whilst doing it.

Megan said: “People signed up to a mailing list and every day we sent them a new provocation and the idea was that you had to write how you felt about taking the photo whilst you were taking it and how you felt about the image.”

The provocations included a selfie where you think you look really nice, one wearing something that makes you feel good, or one showing un- altered body hair.

“It created a really incredible community of people and everyone followed each other and the hashtag and commented on other people’s pictures and people were really sharing and getting vulnerable and raw with it and it was so interesting”

The Girl Gang have also done online projects such as the Girl Gang Vote which worked with Girl Gang Sheffield and Leeds to empower women to use their vote.

Shockingly, women under 30 are the least likely demographic to vote, and especially with 2018 being such a milestone year for females voting Girl Gang are doing their bit to tackle this.

With so many brilliant female collectives and charities in Manchester, Girl Gang is adding to this and helping make Manchester the diverse and accepting city that it is.

They have collaborated with the female and non-binary DJ group The Thirsty Girls as well as Vulva la revolution and Manchester Action on Street Health to name a few.

Of course the Gang recently partnered with The Pankhurst Centre for the launch of their centenary programme.

On the 11^th March the collective is teaming up with the People’s History Museum for women rule Manchester as part of Wonder Woman festival. The gals did this last year and interviewed women for two hours but this year they will will be interviewing interesting and amazing women back to back for five hours on a Facebook Livestream which will be projected in the museums foyer.

 

Girl Gang is bringing the creative, wonderful people of Manchester together and has lots of ideas for the future.

“As soon as we did an event in Sheffield it was really clear that we were doing something that was really different and I think the thing we are proudest of that we do is the feeling at our events which is hard to explain but we just attract such a nice crowd and everybody’s there to have a lovely time and people are so receptive and talkative with one another.” Said Megan.

“Lots of exciting things have happened that I didn’t expect but it’s just about what happens next now.”

The Gang are currently very busy being creative and planning ideas up to two years in advance but for the foreseeable future they have lots of fun up and coming events which you can see here.

Be sure to keep your eyes peeled as the girls are soon set to announce details of their third immersive film screening at The Lowry as part of Week 53 festival.

For that you can expect handmade décor, pop up performances, party bags with homemade mix CD’s and much more.

To see more Girl Gang you can visit their Facebook here or follow their other social media:

Twitter: @Girlgangmcr

Instagram: @Girlgangmcr

You can buy tickets for The Mother’s Day Disco here.