A haunting view of a closed exotic garden

[stephenprudence]

I came across this, Im sure everyone will remember Stapley Water Gardens? Well someone went to have a look at it after it closed back in 2012.. this link is a few months after it closed.. for sure now, most of the plants will be dead, real shame, but tell me this doesn't send shivers down your spine...

http://www.28dayslater.co.uk/forums/oth ... shire.html

[Yorkshire Kris]

I remember they had a big plant sell off.... Obviously not everything sold. What a shame to see it like that?

[stephenprudence]

It'll be even worse now, I imagine vandals will have made short work of the glass houses, I doubt any plants will have survived, but it would be interesting to see the state it's in now.

[RozDevon]

Thats really sad!
Can it be restored and rescued?

[stephenprudence]

As a building now, it probably can't, but I dont know if there's any plans to replace it with something else. A building made almost entirely of glass with not be standing for a more than the next 20 years anyway.

Maybe someone nearby can let us know?

[Blairs]

RHS says the plans is for it to be demolished and turned into housing?

http://www.rhs.org.uk/Gardens/News/Fina ... r-Stapeley

Shame it closed - could have pocketed a few free cuttings for the collection.

[cheshirepalms]

Been there so many times, used to live only 10 miles away, happy memories, used to take my son when he was younger, he turns 13 next month!. It was before I was as interested in Tropicals and palms as I am now and probably didn't appreciate them as much. Shame that its not there now.

[benbaron]

Where is my spade???

[benbaron]

Forget that - just realised it says 2012...

[kata]

Not been or seen it before online but...

[chrismc]

Wow this is gutting. I managed to get there a couple of years ago after work and it was so different to how i remember it.
This place is soley responsible for me keeping freshwater stingrays after i saw them skimming the edge of that Piranha tank , they had an amaizing Malawi cichlid tank in what used to be their aquarium store that i remember drooling over (which is also used in a couple of aquatic reference books i own).
Very sad

[flounder]

I'm not surprised it's closed. I mean, who in their right mind would try to grow exotics and palms in this country?

[jungle jas]

I remember going years ago to buy Koi Carp, I wasn't into exotic gardening then! It was always so busy. I wonder what went wrong.

[Clive60]

I offered the post of Manager of the Palm house complex back in '87 but turned it down due to some dodgy issues with the owners. It was impressive then, shame it has come to this.

[Dave Brown]

Never been, but known of it for many years. They used to advertise in the gardening mags before internet was widely used for selling.

Shame to see it has gone to the wall Was it competing with other attractions in the area? or was it relying on plant sales to fund all the other attractions?