The Towers Woodland

The Towers woodland is a lovely spot just off Victoria Road West in Cleveleys. Now a lovely spot for a walk among the trees and watching the wildlife, it’s the site of a once grand house.

Where to find it:

There’s a number of access points, some of which can be confusing if you don’t know the area. The easiest way to find it is via Holmfield Avenue, between West Drive and Victoria Road West, postcode FY5 2QR.

• From Victoria Road West, behind the bus shelter and duck pond. Two small roads head off to the right and left of the bus shelter, onto Holmfield Avenue. The entrance to The Towers is further along on the right (pictured above).
• Or access Holmfield Avenue via West Drive, the entrance to The Towers is between the houses on your left (pictured above).
• It can also be accessed from Seniors Drive, Cleveleys, FY5 2RB

Take a look around in this video from June 2023, and there’s more about it’s history on this page too.

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The Towers Woodland

If you arrive by car there’s limited parking next to the gates at Holmfield Avenue. Throughout the site there are hard-standing footpaths, although it can still get quite muddy in wet weather. Don’t forget to pick up after your dog – and put poo bags in one of the several bins throughout the site.

The Towers is a beautiful small woodland area and an urban retreat. Cleveleys is an urban area so it’s nice to have somewhere a little ‘wild’ to escape to. Especially since the salty marine air makes it difficult for trees to grow elsewhere.

Enjoy the seasons, from spring blossom, through summer and autumn leaves as they turn red and fall.

Wildlife at The Towers

When you visit The Towers, keep your eyes peeled for songbirds and squirrels.

There’s a clip here of squirrels collecting food in early spring. It’s an old clip and the video quality is awful, but it’s worth it just for the soundtrack of birds singing!

And here’s a more recent clip of a cheeky squirrel hiding food on an autumn day.

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Pond Life

Follow the winding footpaths and you’ll find a small pond and wetland area towards the Victoria Road West side of the site. It’s home to ducks and waterfowl and it’s a magnet for wildlife.

Did you know that terrapins live in this pond and in the Duck Pond? They’re believed to have been released after the Mutant Ninja Turtles craze. It looks like they’ve done very well for themselves! Nearby resident Peter Airton sent in some photos of terrapins that he’d seen on his walks at The Towers in 2020.

Along with the ducks, seagulls and water birds, larger visitors are sometimes spotted. Val and Peter Airton also sent in these photos of a handsome heron who’d dropped in to pay a call –

Herons are a regular sight in the Thornton Cleveleys area. The low-lying land around Amounderness Way is very wet and marshy – a perfect hunting ground for them.

This pond and wetland is separate to the pond accessible near the bus stop on Victoria Road West. That one is known as the Duck Pond (or Swan Pond).

Looking after The Towers

The woodland is managed by Wyre Council. Wyre rangers also work with local schools and youth groups at the site to give young people a better understanding and appreciation of local environmental conservation.

Back in 2012, funding was also secured from the Forestry Commission Woodland Improvement Grants to carry out environmental management work at both The Towers and Pheasant Wood in Thornton. This included the felling of unsuitable trees, replanting native species, and improving boundary treatments, access and pond management.

History of The Towers

Information used in this post has been taken from various sources. Thanks go to

• the Thornton Cleveleys Past Facebook group for some of this information and photos,
• to the information board on site in the Towers
• and of course to Mr Nick Moore’s amazing History of Blackpool and the Fylde Coast.

In the 1800’s, the Towers was wild and wooded, part of hunting land owned by Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood of Rossall Hall. Then in the late 1890s, affluent mill owners and textile merchants the Horrock’s family from Preston bought the land. They built The Towers as a hunting lodge and gamekeeper Kess Hodgkinson lived there. In the 1800s it was where wealthy people came to spend their holidays. The woodlands in the estate once covered a much larger area and provided the shooting grounds for these visitors.

Through the 1900’s

In 1904 Horrocks sold the land to the Fleetwood Estate Company. One of the Directors was TG Lumb and he moved into The Towers. Thomas Gallon Lumb was an engineer and architect and the visionary of Cleveleys, who was instrumental in the installation of the electric tramway.

Lumb worked with Edward Lutyens to develop the houses that still stand today on Rossall Road, and instigated the 1906 Cleveleys Cottage Exhibition. He offered building plots for sale in the 65 acres of land surrounding The Towers. His brochure showed a grid pattern of roads with two or three plots sold. The ICI estate at Thornton was booming and Cleveleys grew successful as a seaside town. Rossall Beach Estate was laid out by TG Lumb who built Beach Croft there for his own home, moving from The Towers Hunting Lodge.

Holmefield was built in 1909 on the Towers Estate by Everard Gadd. In the 1930s, then Mayor of Fleetwood GM Robertson bought it, changing the name to ‘Skerryvore’. But in 1920 Mr WA Lutyens built another house called ‘Holmefield’ just to the south of it in 1920.

From College to Closure

In the late 1920s, The Towers Lodge later became Highfield College, which was a private boarding and day school. It closed in the 1950s and the land was then bought by the council and the main building was demolished around 1970. Look carefully among the undergrowth near the information sign and you’ll see the kerbstones which once marked out the footpaths.

This blog is worth a read on the Fylde and Wyre Antiquarian website, by Michelle Harris and Brian Hughes

The Towers History, as seen Today

The only surviving remnants of The Towers Lodge and the shooting estate are the gate posts and those few bits of kerbstone.

One of the pairs of gate posts is visible at the entrance to Holmfield Avenue on West Drive. Another forms an entrance off Seniors Drive.

Berenice Cooper emailed with recollections of happy times there. She says –

“So interested to read this about the old school Highfield College. In 1960 when I was 13 I visited and eventually worked in my spare time at the stables in the school grounds. I used to take rides out, muck out, help feed the horses etc. In fact I met my future husband there as he was a cousin of Janice Brown who rented the stables. I nearly lived there for about three years until my father died suddenly and I had to get a proper job! Sorry no photos but so many memories of those days.“

Have you got anything to add?

Do you know anything else about the history of this place? Have you got any old photos? (Or recent ones for that matter).

If you have, please leave a comment below or get in touch to send photos. Full credit will be given, just email jane@theRabbitPatch.co.uk.