The rediscovered ‘lost’ garden in Greater Manchester that’s a ‘hidden gem’

Platt Fields Park is more commonly associated with students gathering for picnics and barbeques than it is for hidden horticultural gems. Yet, tucked away in a corner of the park is a rare garden, one of the only a few in the country.

Up until recently The Shakespeare Garden, which lies just off Wilmslow Road, was left to grow wild and untamed, having been neglected for years. But since 2021, restoration work by a group of volunteers has been underway, to restore it to its former glory.

A Shakespearean Garden is one which contains some or all of the 175 plants named in the famous playwright's works and they were largely created during the late 19th and early 20th century. Manchester’s was created in 1916 by Rosa Grindon, a Shakespearean lecturer, suffragist and keen botanist; and officially opened in 1922.

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Many Shakespearean gardens have been lost to the mists of time, and there are only a handful left in the country, which makes this corner of Platt Fields Park a very special place indeed. Kattie Kincaid has been leading the restoration work and wants to shine a light on this rare ‘hidden gem.’

She’s been working alongside a group of volunteers to inject life back into the garden. Kattie told the Manchester Evening News: “When I first visited the garden it was overgrown with weeds and it needed a lot doing to it. It seemed such a shame to lose this piece of our heritage so I began gardening it.”

Gathering together a team of volunteers, they’ve steadily transformed ‘Shakey’, as it's affectionately known. Although it’s still a ‘work in progress’, many of the features have been restored while new ones have been added, including a