Visible from miles around, the spire of St Mary’s nestles into the beautiful landscape of the Lake District. Erected in the 1850’s, in Gothic Revival style, it remains a popular church among the Ambleside community, and occasionally functions as a concert venue.
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
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
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
A heartwarming festive treat for all ages, this brand-new musical adaptation of A Christmas Carol brings Bolton’s stage to life with music, magic and Dickensian spirit.
From £15.00
Three sisters, one bitter-sweet reunion – grief, whisky and buried truths collide in a sharply funny Northern family reckoning.
From £15.00
Bringing music, laughter and a welcome dose of festive cheer, a brand-new adaptation of the Dickensian classic is the perfect festive treat for families this Christmas.
From £15.00
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 entry
Full of interesting and unusual objects, The Armitt is a museum that shares the history and heritage of Ambleside and its people.
A mock gothic castle, far from the usual Windermere crowds, with stunning grounds and a short walk to Claife Viewing station.
A high-end restaurant in the Lake District, combining traditional British ingredients with original modern ideas.
Attempt to hit a clay flying at 65mph or navigate the obstacles along a wood chip track on a Krazy Kart, at this Arts and Crafts style house in Cumbria.
Next door to Dove Cottage, Wordsworth’s first family home, is the Wordsworth Museum, which houses an unsurpassed collection of the Wordsworths’ letters, journals and poems.
From book launches to writing groups to poetry nights, there’s always something going on at Wordsworth Grasmere.
Dove Cottage is where William Wordsworth lived and wrote, and where the Wordsworth Trust continues that work today with poets in residence and public programmes.
Tucked away in a remote corner of the Lake District is Kurt Schwitter’s Merzbarn, an artistic epitaph to the avant garde ‘godfather of modern art’.
Lake District accommodation that manages to be luxurious and environmentally friendly at the same time.
We love the fantastic Forest Side Restaurant. Attached to the historic Forest Side Hotel in Grasmere, this is one of the best places to eat in Cumbria.
A luxurious four star hotel in Grasmere, in the heart of the Lake District.
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.
Manchester’s starting the new year with a run of gigs from some of the country’s best underground exports.
Whether you’re after storybook theatre, museum wanderings or illusion-bending play spaces, there’s plenty to keep curiosity ticking through winter and beyond.
Step away from the usual. Tours and activities that spark curiosity, inspire creativity and offer something refreshingly different.
Theatre across the North West splits between festive escape and sharp, urgent work exploring politics, power and resistance.
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.
Hear ye, hear ye. Take some eating-out tips from our wintertime guide to food and drink in Manchester and the North.
