What's on near Gaskell Hall
Step into the majestic Blackpool Tower Ballroom for an experience like no other. With stunning architecture, live music and treats galore, Afternoon Tea here is highly recommended.
From £60.00
The White Hotel’s Blackpool takeover places The Caretaker, Blackhaine and A Guy Called Gerald inside the town’s most iconic spaces.
From £150.00
Come face to face with SEA LIFE Blackpool’s hungriest resident. This unique experience gives you the chance to feed Phoenix the green sea turtle and learn about this endangered species.
From £75.00
Three sisters, one bitter-sweet reunion – grief, whisky and buried truths collide in a sharply funny Northern family reckoning.
From £15.00
Discover Rochdale’s rich history on this guided tour, featuring the newly restored Town Hall, St Chad’s Church, and the Pioneers Museum.
From £20.00
Foundational British synth-pop band Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark play in Rochdale, with support from Peter Hook and the Light and A Certain Ratio.
From £55.00
The guided tour offers a behind-the-scenes look at the brewhouse and state-of-the-art packaging plant, giving visitors a full sense of what “real Yorkshire beer” means today.
From £15.00
The UK’s most important visual art prize is back for its 2025 edition, with four new artist nominations in Bradford’s Cartwright Hall Art Gallery.
Free entryWhere to go near Gaskell Hall
Famous collection of Gillow furniture and objets d’art, plus gardens and woodland walks. Educational ‘bee corner’, ‘woodland hotel’ and ‘caterpillar maze’ for children.
Carnforth Station is the famous setting of the film Brief Encounter. As you stand on Platform 1 with its vintage suitcases and railway posters, you can almost imagine the era when steam trains frequently passed through.
Independent restaurant, cafe, baker, and deli in the Lake District.
At low tide, the exposed bed of the Irish Sea connects the Lancashire coast with the Cumbrian hills across Morecambe Bay, allowing crossings over the sands.
Sister restaurant to Simon Rogan’s two Michellin starred L’Enclume – more low key but just as tasty.
Morecambe gallery which showcases and sells contemporary works, often by artists from the area, which are varied and beautiful.
One of Cumbria’s finest historical sites, Holker Hall and Garden offers a gloriously asymmetrical pile of rambling galleries and green spaces.
Opening in 2024, Morecambe bay will become a centre for eco tourism with the exciting arrival of the Eden Project North.
A beautiful Elizabethan manor house, featuring the oldest surviving example of a topiary garden – a joy to wander in.
The Westmorland County Show is a traditional county fair dating back to 1799, where tourists and shoppers mix with agricultural professionals and chefs.
Culture Guides
Hear ye, hear ye. Take some eating-out tips from our wintertime guide to food and drink in Manchester and the North.
We have an eclectic mix of gigs for you this month, moving from experimental electronics and noise rock to synth pop, opera, and hyper-local R&B.
Theatre across the North West splits between festive escape and sharp, urgent work exploring politics, power and resistance.
Step away from the usual. Tours and activities that spark curiosity, inspire creativity and offer something refreshingly different.
This season, exhibitions across the North West feel attuned to the world beneath the world – the forces and stories shaping how we see, feel and imagine.
Whether you’re after storybook theatre, museum wanderings or illusion-bending play spaces, there’s plenty to keep curiosity ticking through winter and beyond.
There's no shortage of great films out at the moment, whether you're looking for the latest blockbuster, that hot arthouse flick fresh from Cannes or a cosy classic.