Skegness Tower Gardens is the only recreational grounds in Skegness, it has three/four playing fields one main grass area with smaller fields where ball games can be played.
The park is a beautiful scenic place to have a picnic or sit and enjoy some peace and quiet either on the grass areas or under one of the many trees that’s in Tower Gardens.
If you have little ones you can feed the ducks on the pond or let them play in the kiddies play area. Tower Gardens small kiddies play ground is for children aged 0-12, for older children there is a small assault course this could do with being updated and improved, but it’s OK for the older kids to let of a bit of steam for a few minutes. I often race my kids on the assault course :-)
Dogs are allowed on Tower Gardens, but must be kept on a lead at all times on the park and dog mess has to be picked up or there’s a £2,000 fine. Please don’t leave your dog mess on Tower Gardens it’s disgusting and says more about you than you think :-(
Toilets are available on Tower Gardens, like all public toilets in Skegness there is a 20p charge to use the loo, the toilets are very clean and well looked after.
There used to be a pub on Tower Gardens called Inn on The Park, but it has been disused for many years. The town council have won back the right to own the Inn and they plan to turn it into a Museum or Tea Room, but no date for work to begin or decision as to what it will be used for has been finalised as yet. Hopefully the Inn On the Park will be turned into a new attraction for Skegness and something useful for visitors and the community of Skegness.
Tower Gardens has a band stand, brass bands play between May-September, usually on a weekend except in the school holidays when it can also be some week days. It’s nice to listen to brass bands on a summers afternoon, but it would be nice if once in a while East Lindsey County Council would arrange for other bands of different musical prowess to play at Tower Gardens, so people with other tastes could enjoy a free afternoon or evening listening to music, unfortunately brass bands and the odd Jazz band is all you get at Tower Gardens all right for older folks, or a quick listen with the kids, but it is hard to get children enthusiastic about listening to a brass band.
Tower Gardens does have a problem with rubbish and is very unsightly at times, particularly on benches and in the middle of the playing fields were people have had a picnic and just left behind their trash! The pond is the biggest problem since the wildlife suffers immensely from the rubbish irresponsible people leave behind that blows into the pond.
People drinking alcohol on Tower Gardens is also a menace since glass bottles get smashed and it is a danger for small children and dogs, delicate paw pads. Skegness has a no alcohol on the street policy, so if you are caught with cans or bottles of alcohol you will lose them and be fined.
Please when visiting Tower Gardens dispose of your rubbish properly, there are plenty of bins in Skegness and teach your kids to look after their environment. There’s so much rubbish on Tower Gardens the cleaners can’t keep up :-(
There’s all kinds of wildlife to be seen on Tower Gardens. Wild rabbits, grey squirrels and frogs (we almost trod on a frog the other week!) are some of the wildlife we’ve seen as well as Skegness feathered friends. I’ve never seen so many turtle neck doves, blackbirds and wood pigeons as there are in Skegness. My favorites have to be the finches, if you sit quietly and long enough at the side of the pond you’ll see a rare glimpse of gold finches and green finches flying down from the trees to have a drink on a hot summers day.
Tower Garden Events
Other events are held at Tower Gardens like various Gala’s, but our experience of this is that they are very poor with no effort put into events. It doesn’t matter what they call them: gala, festival or fair, whether it is a charity event or council run, they all follow the same format and they’re awful! All we ever get is an handful of stalls selling what looks like old stuff from peoples garages or junk they picked up at a car boot sales. There’s rarely any games or activities at these Tower Garden events for the family to play.
Unfortunately Tower Gardens event are not worth coming to Skegness for, if you do you’ll go home disappointed, both Skegness Town Council and East Lindsey County Council don’t know how to run a good event in Skegness :-(
Don’t go to Tower Gardens for the events, go because it’s a tranquil environment and a nice place to take the family in Skegness.
Map of Skegness Tower Gardens
Tower Gardens can be access from Grande Parade and Rutland Road.
Skegness Attractions Verdict: Tower Gardens is a very nice park to chill for an hour or two when you visit Skegness, highly recommended.
Skegness Attractions Star Rating for Tower Gardens 9/10
Marie
Reading you report on the Tower Gardens I can aggree with you one most of your observations but I feel I must point out a few things regarding the entertainment. The programme of musical entertainment is quite varied throughout the year. We have Jazz Bands, Swing Bands, 60’s music as well as brass bands. We used to have a country and western band appear regularly but I think they have now disbanded. ELDC expects acts to have there own Insurance so that puts off some acts from using the venue. May I point out that many of our Brass bands are full of young talent and they are very popular with young and old, we often have audiences of over 200 on many summer sunday afternoons. Rock bands have many venues in pubs and clubs where they can perform but large brass bands relly on Bandstands like the one in the Tower gardens to perform in. I and many others regularly attand the concerts and they are much more popular than you make them out to be.
The Tower Gardens is one of the towns real gems, not many seaside towns have a park in the center of the resort like we do..I spend many hours in the garden during the summers months and its a very popular place for visitors of all ages. For myself I would like to see mant more events put on during the season.
Hi Skeggy47,
I walk through Tower Gardens Park twice a day to exercise my back (an hour or so walk every day), once on the way to the beach and once on the way back, so I’ve spent quite a bit of time in the park this summer (it’s a really nice park).
This year we’ve not seen a great deal of variety in the music acts shown on Tower Gardens (mostly brass bands). We’ve seen brass bands and jazz bands and nothing else (in music terms) and we’ve not seen large crowds. Sorry, but different brass bands isn’t a variety of music, it’s only catering for older people.
Our eldest son was in the Skegness Silver Band before he left for University earlier this month and so my wife in particular has spent a fair amount of time listening to the Skegness Silver Band when they play in Skegness.
In our experience the majority of those listening to a brass band are older people, (unless the band is part of something bigger like a parade) it’s hard to get young people interested in that type of music (our kids got bored quickly of listening to their brother play and at one point all three were in a marching band). Don’t get me wrong there’s nothing wrong with having brass bands etc… mainly for older people, but what about everyone else?
I looked up what was shown during the 2009 season and not one event on Tower Gardens I could find went past 4:30 pm, why no early evening entertainment for young people?
Most older people I know (I’m 39 so not sure if I’m old or young :)) wouldn’t deprive the young their music. Personally I listen to all sorts of music from whatever’s in the charts to classical music and I’m really looking forward to the Vampires Rock show at the Embassy this Christmas (I like soft rock music, Bon Jovi, Def Leopard, Guns and Roses etc…). I think it would be great to have rock bands (and other bands covering different genres of music) on Tower Gardens some summer evenings.
This wouldn’t impact on the entertainment for older people, but add something for the young, (keep teenagers out of trouble for starters) it’s no wonder they practically live on the Fairy Dell and Sunshine Play Area in the early evening, they have little to do for free/cheap in Skegness!
We didn’t know about the insurance situation with Tower Gardens, is this normal for band stands at other tourist locations for bands etc… to need their own insurance?
If it is the norm then surely there’s enough bands and acts in the UK with insurance that would be willing to play in Skegness during the summer season?
If not why have East Lindsey District Council made it difficult for bands and acts to play on Tower Gardens?
What about busker’s, do they have an option to play on Tower Gardens (buying a permit or something)?
Skegness needs many more events through the holiday season and Tower Gardens is an ideal location, there should be at least one event on Tower Gardens per week for young visitors and residents during the holiday season so no matter which week someone visits there is something for them.
BTW not posing these questions directly to you Skeggy47, open questions for anyone reading this :)
David
Hi Skeggy47,
Thanks for your comment.
I think you have misunderstood my review, like I said it is nice to listen to a brass band on a summer afternoon, but I know for a fact young kids will not listen for long and families move on. There are people that like to listen to a variety of music and we don’t all go to pubs (I’ve never been in one in my life), so it would be nice to hear something different, I’m not even talking about rock bands. For example a busker was in Skegness 2009 playing various flutes to tradition American Indian music, my son and I listened for over an hour outside M&S, it would have been nice if he would have been allowed to play on Tower Gardens.
Brass bands should still play on Tower Gardens and I wouldn’t take that away from the older generation, they come on holiday here to, just that no one else gets a look in on the free entertainment (when I say free, it’s free to watch not free to the council).
I completely agree with your comment about more events on Tower Gardens, it would be nice to have a traditional village fair with fun and games for the whole family like line dancing classes, Mum and Dad races, it’s a knockout type fun, hoop-a-lar and hook a duck, good old traditional fun.
Craft markets maybe and special fun awareness days.
All that’s needed is a little imagination and Skegness could flourish.
Marie
I was interested to read the various comments on the subject of brass bands appealing to the older generations. I have never been to Tower Gardens or Skegness in my life but I will be paying a visit, driving from North Wales, this weekend BECAUSE of the brass band concert, and ONLY because of the brass band concert being given by the Whitwell Band from Chesterfield. In fact, I hope to be playing with them on this occasion. I grew up in brass bands and loved brass band music as a 12 year old. I am now 52 years old and still playing. My daughter is 23 years old and has been a brass player since she was 8 yrs old. She loves brass band music, in addition obviously to other types of music, and many brass bands are made up of young people. I understand the views expressed in the reviews, because some brass band music can be a bit old fashioned, and it depends on the bands and what they choose to play. Because brass bands are seen as a tradition, they often tend to present a traditional concert in the bandstand type programme, which is what a lot of people expect of them. You have to remember that when picking a concert programme, a band has to try to appeal across a very wide age range, not just in terms of audience but in terms of its own players, because it is very common to see brass bands where the age range can go from around 11 years old to 80 years old, and they don’t necessarily all want to play the same pieces. I agree that some diversity is always to be welcomed at these types of venues so that there is always something for everybody. I do not think it should be mainly brass bands, but of course local authorities have things called budgets, and brass bands tend to be relatively inexpensive compared to other groups. Bandstands are generally constructed with brass bands in mind, because a brass band in the park has been a tradition going back to the time of my grandparents and beyond. Times change, but the image of brass bands tends to be stuck in Victorian times. Maybe it is partly our fault, but many brass bands are doing their best to feature more modern arrangements in their concert programmes so as to appeal to the younger generations. Trouble is, that a brass band is still a brass band, regardless of what it plays. You are either into brass bands or you are not, but you only have to attend any big brass band contest or event to see that there are thousands of young people involved in brass bands, so the only thing I can’t agree with is that they appeal mainly to the older generation. Sue
Great comment Sue, really informative,
I’m glad you understood what I was saying that brass bands are fine, but other forms of music should feature in tower gardens annual events.
Things got out of hand from the first commenter getting upset because I had said it would be nice to have other forms of music on the park during the summer season, then my hubby got involved and the original calm and balanced statement I had made in my review was lost.
So I do appreciate you understood what I was saying, basically they should have a bit of entertainment for everyone in the park.
I know brass bands are relatively cheap costing a few hundred to play, I believe it’s about £300 – £500 for 2hrs on the park, but there are many young bands and other musicians that would love the opportunity to play to an audience on Tower Gardens and they don’t cost that much.
It just seems a shame they don’t seem to spread the budget fairly, for an example this year in Cleethorpes they are having street entertainers to amuse their visitors, particularly families, I do believe there is to be giant stilt walking seagulls and giant gorillas, this would be great for Skegness.
Unfortunately brass bands don’t help with the image of Skegness, most people see Skegness as out dated and having only brass bands just helps them confirm this preconception.
Being out dated and it hasn’t changed in years is visitors greatest criticism of Skegness.
If they (people in charge) was to branch out a bit, it would help people to have a more rounded view of Skegness, which is important for it’s survival in a modern world.
Like I said before in another comment, I’m not talking rock bands more alternative music, nothing loud.
I’ve played trumpet myself for 20 years, I’ve even played in a marching band joined when I was 24-ish and played for about 5 years and personally I’m not that keen on brass bands.
My husband on the other hand hates them as I’m sure you picked up on in the other comments :)
I do sometimes sit and listen to the brass bands on Tower Gardens, like I said in my review it is nice to sit and listen to brass bands occasionally, but it’s all they have here in Skegness :(
I’d just like to broaden my pallet, so to speak, by experiencing new things.
I hope you enjoy your time here in Skegness and you come to Skeg again in the future :)
Marie
Hi, I am one of the dancers which will be performing at the so festival on this Saturday, (23.07.11) but i don’t have the address of the place which i need to get there, so i would really appreciate it if you could comment below with the info, because i need the address of the garden towers because that’s where we will be performing, so i would really appreciate it if you could comment below with the info when and what time it is, i would be very thankful :) thank you, Daria.
Have added a map to the Tower Gardens review above, Tower Garden’s is located between Grande Parade and Rutland Road. Directly across from the Embassy theater (which is on Grand Parade).
Also made a post on the SO Festival Facebook Group http://www.facebook.com/groups/207798716410
David