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Holmes Chapel, three miles south of Manchester, will hold audition rounds to find the right tour guides, The Guardian reports.
Last year, the village was visited by over 5,000 so-called “Harries”, who were out on a pure pop pilgrimage to the place where Styles grew up.
Some have reportedly risked life and limb to visit the site of Harry Styles’ first kiss, a railway bridge near a very busy main road. That prompted the residents of Holmes Chapel to publish a travel guide last year.
Starts in June
Now the locals want to take it further. Local group Holmes Chapel Partnership plans to launch official tours, and later in April will hold auditions to find Styles connoisseurs who should be at least 16 years old. But also “more mature people” can, according to the group’s leader Peter Whiers, try to apply.
Beyoncé makes history
Whiers tells the newspaper that they expect “significant” demand for the tours, which begin in June and continue until September.
“Even in the wet winter months, the Harries have kept coming, crossing muddy banks and wet fields to get to Harry’s Wall,” says the Holmes Chapel resident.
Good shop
The pop pilgrims have led to good business, including for the bakery where Harry Styles worked part-time before he became famous with One Direction. The bakery offers a full-size poster of Styles holding a white loafer, which has become a bestseller.
The tour will also take fans to his former schools, the townhouse he grew up in, and a Chinese restaurant where he and Taylor Swift are said to have visited.
But the biggest draw is Twemlow Viaduct , the railway bridge where he kissed and also scrawled his name in the 2013 film. Fans call it ‘Harry’s Wall’, and make pilgrimages there to write their name next to his.
