Next phase of work at historic gardens

For the past 15 months, groups of local people have been helping to transform the area by hand.

However this month sees the programme step-up a gear when some small-scale machinery will be needed to do the heavier work.

Groundwork project manager Andrew Suter said: “The transformation of parts of the Terraced Gardens to date is amazing.

“Hundreds of hours of hard work have gone into this result and we’re really grateful to the people and businesses who have volunteered to help. We now need to bring in bigger machinery to carry out the work we can’t do with our hands, such as restoring the Pigeon Tower and the Italian Lake, but we want to reassure people that looking after the nature and wildlife living in the gardens is our top concern.

This project is designed to enhance the special habitat, protecting species and allowing it to thrive.”

The work to conserve and protect the gardens will eventually lead to all the structures on site being made safe and opened for public events for the first time in decades.

Improved information boards and guided tours will help visitors understand the historical significance of the gardens.

Lord Leverhulme worked with landscape architect Thomas Mawson on the design of the Terraced Gardens in the early 1900s.

He died in 1925 and the gardens almost immediately fell into a state of disrepair, with a new landowner, Liverpool Water Corporation, taking ownership of the site for water supplies.

They were opened to the public in 1948.

The regeneration project is led by the Rivington Heritage Trust (RHT) in partnership with Groundwork and is part-funded with £3.4m of money from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF): Parks for People Programme.