It’s been named as the coolest place to live in the UK and is already home to some of the best nights out Liverpool can offer.

But if you were shown a map of the city centre, could you point out exactly where the Baltic Triangle begins and ends?

And what’s more, do you know how the area came to be called that in the first place?

With the introduction of venues such as Camp & Furnace and the Baltic Social, the Baltic has become a lot more than an industrialised area in the streets behind Merseyside Police HQ.

Bars and restaurants that can claim a spot in the Triangle are further apart than you’d think.

The small venue 24 Kitchen Street - home to the regular Sonic Yootha club nights and the Jeremy Corbyn rave which sent the notion of singing the Labour leader’s name to the tune of The White Stripes’ Seven Nation Army viral - is also part of the Baltic.

But to get there from Camp & Furnace, it’s a Fitbit-friendly 320 metre walk up Jamaica Street before turning left on to Blundell Street (the road after Kitchen Street) where you’ll find the main entrance.

At the ECHO, we love nothing more than doing a little research in order to answer life’s probing questions so we set about determining the Baltic boundaries once and for all.

The Baltic Triangle has become a hub for the city's creative community
The Baltic Triangle has become a hub for the city's creative community

Google Maps says the city council defines the Baltic as the ‘area bounded by Liver Street, Park Lane, Parliament Street and Chaloner Street’.

However, a spokesman for Baltic Creative, the organisation which provides spaces for the creative businesses that set up home in the Triangle had a different answer for us.

Although it’s agreed that Liver Street (where the entrance to John Lewis car park is located) marks the beginning of the Baltic Triangle, the Creative have it finishing at Hill Street.

This makes the venues on the opposite side of Parliament Street, including Ghetto Golf, Cains Brewery and the Baltic Market officially part of the Triangle as well (which makes sense) and also includes the businesses on Mann Street, Caryl Street, Grafton Street and Beaufort Street. That’s a lot more Baltic for your buck.

So, in case you were wondering, we can now clear it up for you.

A Muhammad Ali statue has been erected in The Baltic Triangle

The Baltic Triangle is the entire area between Liver Street and Hill Street that’s bounded by the A561 to the east and Wapping/Sefton Street to the west.

Which just leaves us with the name and like so many things in the city, it relates to Liverpool’s history as a major port and the fact that major building projects in other parts of the country often led to a scarcity of oak, meaning it had to be imported. Poland and Germany were popular sources of timber, as was Norway.

Liverpool historian Dan Longman tells us: “The area used to have a lot of timber warehouses and timber yards there. We were importing a lot of our timber from Baltic countries like Norway at the time.

Paul Curtis is the man behind the amazing new artwork in the Baltic Triangle

“This was because we had a lot of arable and farming land back then so we needed a lot of timber so I would suggest that is how the area got its name.

“Another giveaway is that the Scandinavian Church is based in the Baltic Triangle so there has always been that strong geographical link.”

The Scandinavian Church was established following a recommendation by the London-based Swedish Norwegian Church Council in the 1860s.

This was due to the fact that around 50,000 people from Sweden, Norway and other nations on the Baltic Sea were passing through the city each year because of Liverpool’s place in the shipping lanes. They needed places to meet.

Another explanation comes from city tour guide John Maguire, who told us: "It dates back to when Liverpool had a small but lucrative whaling industry, the likes of Greenland Street where Camp and Furnace is was named after the fishing grounds.

"Apparently, it was pretty grisly round there in late Georgian and Regency times, with streets used to carve up the catch."

Dan added: “It could be said the area was Liverpool’s Little Baltic in much the same way that cities have a Little Italy, with plenty of sailors and merchants frequenting the area through their international dealings in the timber trade.”

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