Celebrating Wigan borough's past as Heritage Open Days return

People are being invited to explore and learn more about Wigan’s history as Heritage Open Days return with free events and activities.

Thousands of venues around the country will be taking part, with 25 events due to be held across Wigan from September 8 to 17.

Among them will be a five-mile heritage walk at Haigh Woodland Park; a virtual tour of historic locations in Wigan town centre at the Real Crafty pub; a guided tour of exhibitions at the Museum of Wigan Life; a tour of Leigh Town Hall and a chance to see the new facilities at Archives: Wigan & Leigh; and guided tours of grade II*-listed Damhouse in Astley.

A number of religious buildings are welcoming visitors, including St Wilfrid’s Church in Standish, St Peter’s Church in Westleigh and Chowbent Unitarian Chapel in Atherton.

Park Lane Unitarian Chapel, Bryn, is hosting a table top and heritage display on Saturday September 9 from 10am to 1pm. There will be stalls, a raffle, books, photo displays, old documents, school registers and refreshments plus a chance to look round the chapel, built in 1697, itself. At 11am Ian Lowe will give a talk on its history.

A series of events are being organised as part of Tyldesley Heritage Arts Festival, including loom weaving, a heritage dance performance, tours of a replica coal mining gallery and the chance to learn the heritage craft of wet felting.

Heritage Open Days feature thousands of events and activities across the country, including places that usually charge, free sites that put on special events for the festival and places not usually open to the public.

They are brought by the National Trust, supported by players of People’s Postcode Lottery and run by thousands of local organisations and volunteers.

Hundreds of activities will adopt this year’s theme Creativity Unwrapped, sharing England’s colourful history of creativity.

Liam Montgomery, Heritage Open Days marketing and projects manager, said: “Whether it’s art, music, writing or another outlet, creativity moves us and shapes our history and culture.

"This year organisers have once again come up trumps and created a stellar programme of events which put the spotlight on the people and places who give England’s heritage the X-factor and inspire festival-goers to engage with thousands of years of creativity.

“And it is the organisers who make this possible, and whose hard work enables over a million people to engage with heritage, for free, on their doorstep every September.”

For full details of events happening across the borough, go to www.heritageopendays.org.uk