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'Pizza abominations are flying out of the kitchen but, hey, the place has a banging DJ'
Heeeey, isn't this cool? Just look at the size of it: a bare-bricked football pitch, crammed with Manchester's glammed-up party crowd. There are paparazzi outside; one confides mournfully, "We've got a tipoff that Towie or Geordie Shore are coming down, but I don't know what they look like." And, to be fair, the beautiful people in here could easily grace a TV reality show.
And check out the crazy art: floor projections and funky oils; wire men dangling off the outside wall; and there's a door on the vestibule wall etched with a wrinkled visage. "Is it Lord Suralan Sugar?" I ask. "No," says the cheery receptionist, "it's Ewan McGregor."
It's a long time since I've seen a menu this lengthy– there must be more than 60 different dishes, from fancy cuisine to comfort food. If there isn't something on it to float your boat, you must be a right old codger. Talk about variety.
Nope, I can't keep this up. I want so much to like Artisan. But, with the exception of the sparky service – especially from tiny Jennifer – I simply cannot. It feels like a factory, a processing plant for poseurs who care more about being seen than what's on their plates. (Not that you can be seen: the entire United team could be at the other end of this immense, raucous space and I'd be none the wiser.) And that food is impressively bad, too. There's the pizza slathered with a bbq sauce that tastes like boiled-up Fisherman's Friends, capped with shrivelled, biltong-textured "pulled pork" and shavings of pineapple. Its base is thin, cracker-crisp and scorched, like an overgrown water biscuit. The "Lyonnaise" salad that looks generous for its £10.95 price tag turns out to be volumes of flouncy lettuce caching waterlogged, unpeeled spuds, elderly croutons, a smattering of bacon and oikish garlic sausage. Worst of all is what's called a "cassoulet". Is it buggery: it's an unconnected group of ingredients, introduced via the medium of tinned tomato and butter beans. The belly pork is tasteless; the duck less confit, more Kentucky fried quacker.
Actually, I lie. It's not all terrible. Queenie scallops suffer from brackish "curry butter" and grouty cauliflower puree, but they're bearable. And there's a decent retro Arctic roll as a finale. Whoop-de-doo.
Oh, sure, with my poncey restaurant critic ways, I'm not the target audience. I'm not keen on being recorded for posterity in the photo-booth or hanging out in the steam-punky bar or over-designed ladies' loos (the "Bitching Room"; yuck and thrice yuck). But aiming a restaurant at the yoof party crowd shouldn't preclude edible food. It can be done: I'm happy to steer my snobby bahookie into Rotary, Byron, Bunga Bunga or SoLita; and Pizza East, in whose industrial-chic environs I bet Artisan's management has taken copious notes, does this kind of thing beautifully, complete with sourdough pizza that actually bends in the middle.
Did I look for trouble by ordering that particular pizza? Maybe. Perhaps I should have had the doner kebab one. Or "smoked salmon in a can". Or the mackerel nailed and baked on a pine plank like a supporting actor in Saw XI. Or the gammon, fried egg and frozen McCain crinkle chips at £12.95.
Artisan is owned by Living Ventures, who have sprawled their brand all over the glittery Spinningfields complex. They're capable of better than this: their Australasia raised the game for Manc city-centre dining, and they're backing the forthcoming Manchester House with lauded chef Aiden Byrne. But, hey, Artisan has got a, er, banging DJ, it's pretty much filled nightly and those pizza abominations are flying out of the kitchen. They should give a monkey's.
And that door art? It isn't Ewan McGregor; I finally figure out it's Ian McKellen. Like so much else here, from the menu to the email saying, "We'll require this table back at 21.00", they just got it all a bit wrong.
• Artisan Avenue North, 18-22 Bridge Street, Manchester, 0161 832 4181. Open all week, noon-midnight (1am Thurs, 2am Fri & Sat, 11pm Sun). About £30 a head, plus drinks and service.
Food 2/10
Atmosphere Febrile
Value for money 3/10
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