Walton Hall and Gardens Glasshouses and Conservatory Range

Walton Hall, on the southern edge of Warrington, belonged to the Greenall family, whose wealth came from a brewery founded at Wilderspool in 1762. The estate's own history says Lord Daresbury made the estate a model of agricultural excellence and that open days, above all the annual Walton Show, drew up to 45,000 visitors; Lady Daresbury employed twenty-six gardeners. The estate's "Lady Daresbury" walk leaflet lists, among the attractions of those days, a fernery, a tropical plant house and a main conservatory with tall bamboos and goldfish in a central tank.

The estate says only that most of the bricks reused in the restoration date from 1899 to 1910. Warrington's council bought the estate in 1941 and the gardens opened to the public on 19 May 1945. Tomatoes were grown under glass during the war, and bananas were even grown in the conservatory in the 1980s.

Closed to the public in September 1993, the conservatory range slowly fell into disrepair. The National Lottery Heritage Fund supported a restoration scheme from 2016; the grant, of about GBP 2 million, was awarded to a joint bid by the council, Myerscough College, the Walton Lea Partnership and the Friends of Walton Estate. Rosslee Construction spent seventeen months on site to designs by Bradshaw Gass & Hope. The official opening dates from October 2019; the first Myerscough College students had arrived in September 2019. In 2020 the scheme was a finalist in three categories of the LABC North West Building Excellence Awards.

The estate describes a main glasshouse, an atrium, wings, a courtyard, a vinery and a yard named after a neighbouring building, the Shippon (a cowshed). According to the council, the main glasshouse is organised around a central atrium with a fish pond; the smaller vinery stands across the Shippon yard from it. The architects speak of a glasshouse and attendant bothy structures (service rooms or lodgings for gardeners), restored for community groups, businesses and educational bodies.

The restoration kept most of the original fabric. The thousands of timber pieces forming the frame were taken apart, tagged and checked one by one for rot; most were reused inside, with new wood kept for the external beams. Nearly all the ironwork was repaired, refitted and repainted, the most prominent original colour being a powder blue. More than 90 per cent of the bricks were reused with lime mortar. OpenStreetMap tags the building as a glass greenhouse.

The council mentions a central fish pond surrounded by award-winning botanical plants in the main glasshouse, and the Visit Chester listing refers to award-winning botanical displays. Myerscough College describes the conservatory and vinery as teaching, growing and display space, and the seasonal bedding opposite the conservatory is designed and maintained by the Walton Lea Partnership.

The Lady Daresbury walk leaflet lists the older collections: ferns in the fernery, tropical plants in a dedicated house, tall bamboos in the main conservatory. The same document notes that peaches were grown in the estate's kitchen gardens, tomatoes during the war and bananas in the conservatory in the 1980s. In the park, a few of Lady Daresbury's plants survive, notably bright pink azaleas, and the estate's rhododendrons were once counted among the best in the north of England.

The conservatory range lies in the council-run Walton Hall park; the park also has formal gardens and the old hall. According to the estate, the main glasshouse and atrium open during park hours; the wings are closed in Myerscough College term time, with public access on some weekends, while the courtyard, vinery and Shippon yard open at weekends.

The "Lady Daresbury" walk (about 1,150 metres, wheelchair-accessible except for one stretch with steps) links the conservatory to the sensory garden, the pond, the dell, the orchard and the hall, and passes some of the azaleas that survive from Lady Daresbury's time.