The Circle

SALFORD, MANCHESTER
PHOTOGRAPHED IN 2022

Orginally based at the Fizzy Hayes Material Store House apartments in Hayes near London, The Circle was filmed in Block A of the Adelphi Wharf 1 apartments at 11 Adelphi Street, Salford (with a unit base opposite) from 2019 until the programme’s end in 2021.

The apartment block was chosen as an ideal location due to the fact that it was brand new and still empty, as well as not being overlooked from any direction. Like its London predecessor, it also had a rooftop garden on the 7th floor, with space available for a yoga studio and gym, as well as underground parking.

Despite housing over 200 apartments, the show’s producers, Studio Lambert, only used ten of them, along with the aforementioned spaces and a further two rooms for other on-screen purposes such as ‘The Inner Circle’. As well as this, a 100m long LED light ring was temporarily fixed to the side of the building on an aluminum track, visible below on Google Street View:

The production, which includes international versions filmed at the same location with different interior decor, used over 100 cameras and 50 microphones which would be rigged in the months prior to the commencement of filming on each series, making it the biggest fast-turnaround rig on British television at the time. And now that it’s not, you can stay in the apartments.

Production, meanwhile, was based on the University of Salford’s disused Adelphi Campus on Peru Street, where over 50 producers would be working around the clock to put the programme together, reportedly at a cost of £400,000 an hour. The University’s relatively new Centenary Building (click to see inside) housed the production gallery and 30 edit suites, while the studio was a temporary soundproofed structure located in the campus courtyard and car park. The Farmer Norton Car Park, also on Peru Street, was used for audience parking.

Both the Centenary Building and adjacent Adelphi Building are set to be demolished in 2025.

Gallery