Over the last 4 years we have hosted forest schools and children’s activities at Platt Fields Market Garden.

We’re passionate about making the garden a place for children to connect and make memories in nature. Learning about food, biodiversity whilst making friends and getting muddy with the freedom to explore safely.

Our sand pit and muddy kitchen area is situated at the back of the garden next to The Frog House, a multipurpose area where we also run workshops and events.

The space is accessible to everyone when the garden is open.

From 2021 - 2024 we worked with MCR Bees Forest School to host Forest School sessions over the school holidays funded by Young Manchester and the MCC SEND department. The sessions were focused around messy play and fun in nature.

Our in house kitchen team provided delicious and healthy warm meals and snacks for the attendees, using fresh produce from the garden.

Our chefs ran cooking classes and involved the children with creating their lunches and picking ingredients from the garden.

Mini Diggers is the name of our ‘stay and play’ sessions where parents could bring their little ones to mess and play whilst enjoying a drink from the cafe. This is something that we would love to run again in the future.

The Ugly Bug Ball is our annual summer celebration, free for everyone to attend. Kids dress up as bugs, there’s a parade, music, food and activities celebrating all things buggy!

We have also ran a number of workshops over the years with schools, young people and universities, teaching participants about growing, nature and cooking food with fresh ingredients with food grown at home.

We’d love to run more workshops like this in 2026.

Get in touch if you’re interested!