The Gladstone Museum in sheet available to guide you round. It’s free, Longton (open Tuesdays - Saturdays, and there’s a prize - just ask at reception. ticket prices vary) is under ten minutes Swing from the enormous willow tea away by car, and home to a gallery that saucer in the outdoor play area, follow cannot fail to delight small people who the Hem Heath Woods and nature trail love toilet humour. Flushed with Pride is (adjacent to the site), or take a Factory dedicated to the history of the loo and the Tour (Monday - Friday, guided tours 45 particular role that potters have played in mins, bookable on arrival, last entry 3pm. its development; discover some surprising £10 adults, £8 concessions, under 12s toilet paper alternatives and a real free). See the production process and insight into what a Victorian slum would artisan skills up close from casting and have looked (and smelled) like through hand turning through to hand painting and ATTRACTIONS the interactive displays. Watch daily gilding of fine bone china and Jasperware. demonstrations and see traditional skills. Also from 1 August to 23 November 2018 Try your hand at throwing a pot, making there is a special World War I exhibition, EVENTS a bone china flower or decorating a piece Etruria at War: The Impact of the First of pottery to create a unique souvenir of World War on and its your visit for a small extra charge. The café Employees (10am-5pm, free). offers colour-in lunch boxes for kids as Your final destination for the day is FESTIVALS well as speciality Oatcakes for grown-ups. Also at the museum in Trentham Gardens (open daily, ticket August and September is the ‘The Festival prices vary): here, the Capability Brown- of Bottle Ovens’, celebrating the 40th designed lake comes complete with trips EXHIBITIONS anniversary since the last firing on eco-friendly catamaran Miss Elizabeth in Stoke-on-Trent including a bus tour and (every hour, five days a week in summer, costumed characters who will showcase £2), and is surrounded by the Trentham the history of the bottle ovens - and of the Fairy Trail - Titania points the way to 14 AND activities most horrible and dangerous jobs once fairy friends created by local artist Robin undertaken by children in The . Wight, some bold, some hidden in the trees. The meadows are filled with giant happening across Alternatively, if you’re keen to get crafty dandelion sculptures, there’s a resident sit- again, make the journey from Stoke astride miniature train, a Hide and Speak the city IN 2018 straight to World of Wedgwood in Maze dotted with talking pipes and an Appetite • Photograph courtesy of Dan Tucker

Barlaston (open daily except 27-31 August, Adventure Playground, featuring an assault m eu us free entry to museum, see website for course, zip wire, sand pits, Young Drivers M y er more details and prices) to have a go at Zone (children aged five and under) and Summer in Stoke-on-Trent tt o P e pottery painting and ceramic design in three activity boats. If the troops get n o t s the Decorating Studio, where you can hungry, the Italian Garden Tearoom serves Itinerary for Families d la choose from clay cut-out shapes, tea light traditional Staffordshire oatcakes, and just Spend a day or more exploring Stoke-on-Trent, G holders and pots. This award-winning outside the gardens is Trentham Shopping and you’ll discover award-winning museums visitor attraction is home to the UNESCO Village, a complex of timber lodges with prizes for Pottery Spotters trails, recognised V&A museum collection, one of housing 77 shops and 18 cafés. Don’t forget enchanting, fairy-filled gardens and the largest the most important in the world, spanning a visit to Monkey Forest to end your day in ever find of Anglo-Saxon treasure. Made up from 1759 to the present day - with a The Potteries. of six distinct towns, Stoke-on-Trent is a place Pottery Spotters Museum Trail activity where revolutionary ideas, country estates and an historic industry remain, but have also been For a journey across the city to commemorate For more ideas, attractions, seasonal reinvented into hands-on pottery painting the fallen heroes of World War I as part of events and recommendations across classes, a ‘Hide and Speak Maze’ and giant, Stoke-on-Trent Remembers visit… all six towns and parks explore… interactive tea cups made from willow. Known affectionately as ‘The Potteries’, the city’s www.stoke.gov.uk/stokeremembers www.visitstoke.co.uk/summer curiously named jiggers, jolliers, fettlers and casters are still working to inspire a new generation of potters. There’s so much visitstoke @visitstoke @visit_stoke VisitStoke to do and see, we’ve suggested a whole host of family-friendly options; pick and

s choose your own route, or make a plan n e Summer in Stoke-on-Trent is funded through the d r Stoke-on-Trent Cultural Destinations programme to stay for longer... a G funded by Arts Council . m a th www.visitstoke.co.uk/summer n re T t a ail Tr ry Fai y tor ac F er at w e g d ri B a m MUST-SEES THE ITINERARY m E Factory Middleport Pottery is your starting of the jiggers, jolliers, fettlers, casters and ST1 3EJ place for the day... if you’re travelling decorators who work here. You can also Discover the traditional skills and on the bus, or alternatively whilst driving enjoy a home cooked lunch in the café, craftsmanship that goes into making Emma around The Potteries, download and listen where children’s lunch boxes are on offer, Bridgewater’s charming designs - or create to Wedgwood and the War (available or take tea and cakes in the secret walled your own. Open daily, factory tour £2.50 on www.appetitestoke.co.uk), an audio garden, complete with its resident brood adults/under 16s free. soundscape drawn from the Wedgwood of hens. At The Potteries Museum & Art www.emmabridgewaterfactory.co.uk Museum’s archive of letters sent by family Gallery (open daily, free entry, pay on arrival members during World War One. The at car park opposite), which is home to the Trentham Gardens factory tour at Middleport Pottery is most significant collection of Staffordshire ST4 8JG This multi award-winning site boasts a suitable for over eights (advance booking, ceramics in the world, you’ll find galleries Fairy Trail, interactive maze, miniature 1hr, 11am and 1.45pm Monday - Thursday, covering natural science, archeology and train and adventure playground complete 10.30am Friday, £9.50 adults / £8 conc.) fine art, a special trail to help Ozzy the

s with climbing wall, zip wire and Young and reveals every stage of production, Owl find the nocturnal animals around the n e d r Drivers Zone, all within multi award-winning showcasing handcraft methods used since museum (£1/trail, including a free pencil), a G m gardens. Open daily, ticket prices vary. the 1880s and the steam engine that once and the Staffordshire Hoard - a treasure a th ood en www.trentham.co.uk powered the entire factory - while the trove that was once the possession of gw Tr ed f W shop is suitable for any age... and offers kings. The museum is also holding a o d rl o World of Wedgwood up the world’s largest collection of local special display “Made by the Girls of W ST12 9ER . For a takeaway souvenir Staffordshire…”: Ceramics from World Take a Pottery Spotters trail through over of your own creation, head to reception War I (27 July - 22 August) featuring 250 years of British craftsmanship and the for a bag of clay and tools (£2 fee); the objects from its collection “Made by the UNESCO recognised V&A collection - or blow off steam in the centre’s outdoor play clay is air-drying and can be taken home Girls of Staffordshire during the Winter of area. Open daily, free entry to museum. on the day. When visiting Middleport, look 1917 when the Boys were in the Trenches Glads ton out for special activities in nearby fighting for Liberty & Civilisation”, as well e P www.worldofwedgwood.com ot te such as the Burslem Summer of Art (28 as CSI - Scientific WW1 (15 September, ry M u July - 16 September) festivities: there will 11am-4pm, free), a one-off interactive event s e u m ST3 1PQ be a Poetry Trail on public transport, arts showcasing the science behind the First Enjoy special workshops, pottery throwing trail WHAT IS NOW featuring artists and World War, including trench archeology and decorating, and a rather unusual gallery curators working in six pop-up locations, and the chemistry behind explosives. There dedicated to the history of the toilet in the Burslem in Bloom and Bunting, music will be a replica underground tunnel, a last complete Victorian pottery factory in the festival weekends, a WW1 themed real ale medical display and an Ask an Expert panel country. Open Tuesdays - Saturdays, ticket trail and Staffordshire Filmshow, as well as primed to give insights into any wartime prices vary. three major exhibitions showcasing local photographs and medals visitors bring. www.stokemuseums.org.uk/gpm artists (see visitstoke.co.uk/summer for Stoke, meanwhile, is host to a captivating more details). The Potteries Museum & Art Gallery installation by artist Luke Jerram called ST1 3DW Next, you can either make a stop in Hanley the Museum of the Moon at King’s Hall Visit the world’s most significant collection for the Emma Bridgewater Factory (open (21-29 August, free entry, special events of Staffordshire ceramics (including nearly Middle daily) and The Potteries Museum & Art will be ticketed): find a good spot to port Po 300 frog mugs) and the £3m Staffordshire tte Gallery, or head straight on to Stoke - both count the craters on a seven metre-wide ry Hoard, the largest ever find of Anglo-Saxon treasure. Open daily, free entry. towns are a 10-20 minute drive away from moon, complete with detailed imagery

T www.stokemuseums.org.uk/pmag Middleport. At the Emma Bridgewater of the lunar surface and accompanied by h e P Factory, you can get creative in the a haunting soundtrack (by BAFTA and o t te rie Middleport Pottery decorating studio (advance booking, 1hr Ivor Novello award-winning composer s Mu seu ST6 3PE 30min slots, 9.30am-2.45pm, £2.95 fee Dan Jones). Spellbinding to look at, the m & ry Art Galle Fans of BBC Two’s The Great Pottery plus price of piece), have a piece of pottery installation is paired with a series of special Throw Down will recognise this award- personalised with your child’s hand or moon-inspired events - see winning, Grade II* listed site, which was foot prints by the team (Monday - Friday, www.appetitestoke.co.uk/whatson for originally built in 1888 and has recently 9.30am, £20 - contact in advance) or details. Just round the corner is the newly undergone a £9 million restoration by The follow a factory tour (suitable for five years opened, Alice in Wonderland-inspired Prince’s Regeneration Trust. Open daily, £5.50 adults/£4 conc. plus, advance booking, 1hr, 10am, 11am and The Rabbit Hole Tea Room; serving up 1.30pm except Fridays, £2.50 adults/ under afternoon tea in a storybook setting, it’s www.visitstoke.co.uk/summer www.middleportpottery.org 16s free) to discover the traditional skills well worth a visit.