The Towers (Manchester)

The Shirley Institute was established in 1920 as the British Cotton Industry Research Association at The Towers in Didsbury, Manchester, as a research centre dedicated to cotton production technologies. It was funded by the Cotton Board through a statutory levy. A significant contribution to the purchase price of The Towers was made by William Greenwood, the MP for Stockport, who asked that the building be named after his daughter. The Institute developed Ventile, a special high-quality woven cotton fabric. It also developed the tog as an easy-to-follow measure of the thermal resistance of textiles, as an alternative to the SI unit of m2K/W. The BCRA merged with the British Rayon Research Association to form the Cotton, Silk, and Man-Made Fibres Research Association in 1961. Douglas Hill was director of research of the BCRA before the merger, and led the new organisation. The director of the BRRA, Leonard Albert Wiseman became deputy director. Len Wiseman became director on Hill's retirement in 1969, and held the post until 1980. In 1987–1990 it merged with the Wira Technology Group to form the British Textile Technology Group (BTTG).

East Didsbury is a suburban railway station in south Manchester, England. On the Styal Line between Longsight (Slade Lane Junction) and Wilmslow, it is served by Liverpool Lime Street-Manchester Airport and Crewe trains operated by Northern Trains, Llandudno - Manchester Airport services operated by Transport for Wales and some peak Manchester Airport services operated by TransPennine Express. East Didsbury tram stop is close to the railway station.

Fletcher Moss Botanical Garden is in Didsbury, Manchester, England, between the River Mersey and Stenner Woods. The park is named after Alderman Fletcher Moss, who donated the park to the city of Manchester in 1915. It is part botanical garden and part wildlife habitat, but also offers recreational facilities such as tennis courts, rugby and football pitches, and a family-run café and ice cream parlour.

Didsbury East is an area and electoral ward of Manchester, England. It is represented in Westminster by Jeff Smith MP for Manchester Withington. The 2011 Census recorded a population of 14,333.

The Didsbury Campus on Wilmslow Road, Didsbury, Manchester, England, originally a private estate, was part of the Manchester Metropolitan University; the oldest building on the site dated to around 1785. It became a theological college for the Wesleyan Methodist Church in 1842, about the same time as a chapel which later became part of the college was built. These buildings are now all listed. In 1946, in response to a growing need for new teachers across the country, the site became a temporary teacher training college, becoming permanent in 1950. Over the next thirty years there was a significant building programme, with classrooms, lecture theatres, offices, sports facilities and a library all being constructed. The college became a part of Manchester Polytechnic (later Manchester Metropolitan University) in 1977. In 2005, the campus became home to the Science Learning Centre North West. The university closed the campus in 2014, sold the land to developers, and moved its facilities to a new purpose-built campus named Birley Fields in Hulme. All the buildings constructed after the Second World War were then demolished, with only the listed buildings remaining. As of 2018 these are being converted into homes, as part of the site's redevelopment as a residential area.

St James, Didsbury, on Stenner Lane, is a Grade II* Church of England church in the Manchester suburb of Didsbury and with Emmanuel church is part of the parish of St James and Emmanuel, Didsbury.

St Paul's Methodist Church is a former Methodist church in the Manchester suburb of Didsbury. The building was designed by the architect H.H. Vale as a church for the nearby Wesleyan Theological Institution and opened in 1877. The building was converted into an office space in 1990. It is recorded in the National Heritage List for England as a designated Grade II listed building.

Parrs Wood is an area of East Didsbury, in south Manchester, England. It was formerly the estate surrounding Parrs Wood House, an 18th-century Georgian villa.Today the area incorporates part of Wilmslow Road and is home to Parrs Wood High School and Sixth Form Centre, a Tesco supermarket, and Parrs Wood Entertainment Centre.

The Ladybrook Valley begins in the English Peak District and runs through Stockport. In its 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) course the brook falls 275 metres (902 ft). At various points it is called Bollinhurst Brook, Norbury Brook, Bramhall Brook, the Ladybrook and the Mickerbrook. The valley has some notable features along its course including Bramall Park and the seven arches railway viaduct in Cheadle Hulme. South of Hazel Grove it is used to delineate the boundary between Greater Manchester and Cheshire. The Ladybrook is a tributary of the River Mersey, the confluence being near to Cheadle Village, immediately after flowing under the M60 motorway.

Parrs Wood House is an 18th-century Georgian villa in the Parrs Wood area of Didsbury, Manchester, England. It was described by Pevsner as "a poorer man's Heaton Hall." It was designated a Grade II* listed building on 25 February 1952.The "white stucco mansion" consists of a "square main block with (two) unequal service wings on (the) north side. It is of two storeys and [three] bays [with] a three-window service range to the left." The architect of the house is unknown, but "it may have been designed by a member of the Wyatt family". Parrs Wood House was bought in 1795 by Richard Farrington, whose brother, the diarist and artist Joseph Farrington, died there after falling down the stairs of the Church of St James, Didsbury, in 1821. From 1825 Parrs Wood House was home to the Tory MP James Heald (1796–1873). Heald was a member of the Wesleyan Methodist Church and a prominent philanthropist, supporting a number of charitable causes. He was elected MP for Stockport in 1847 alongside Richard Cobden. Following his death, St Paul's Methodist Church, Didsbury was erected as a memorial to him. James Heald did not marry and had no children. The Parrs Wood estate passed to his nephew after his death, and remained in the family until in the 1920s, when it was sold to the Manchester Corporation, on the provision that it would be used for educational purposes. The estate later became the location of Parrs Wood High School and Parrs Wood Rural Studies Centre. The mansion was formerly the music building and is now the sixth-form centre of Parrs Wood High School. In 2000, much of the school land was sold to property developers who built a large entertainment complex, changing the area "from a semi-rural educational enclave into a leisure complex". During the redevelopment, Parrs Wood House suffered damage and theft, and the original stables burnt down.

The Capitol Theatre was a cinema in Didsbury, Manchester later used as television studios by ITV contractor ABC Weekend TV from 1956 to 1968. The building opened as a cinema in 1931, but was badly damaged by fire in April 1932 and was closed for repairs until August 1933. The cinema was equipped for the production of live shows, and was used for occasional pantomimes and amateur theatrical performances. In 1956 it was converted into television studios for ABC Weekend TV. Programmes such as Opportunity Knocks and Police Surgeon were made in the studios. Following the merger of Associated Rediffusion and ABC to create Thames Television (on air from July 1968) the studios were leased to Yorkshire Television in 1967 for recording pre-launch programming whilst their own studios were being constructed and in 1970 was sold to Manchester Polytechnic and was the base for their theatre and television school from 1971. Renamed the Horniman Theatre, it staged performances by students of the college, including early performances by Julie Walters, Bernard Hill, and David Threlfall.The theatre reverted to its original name in 1987, and the polytechnic was granted university status as "Manchester Metropolitan University" on 15 September 1992 under the provisions of the Further and Higher Education Act 1992. As part of the university restructuring in 1997, the building was sold to a development company and demolished to make way for blocks of flats. The School of Theatre moved its faculty and performance space to the All Saints campus on Oxford Road, where there is now a new Capitol Theatre, a 140-seat studio space.

Didsbury Village is a tram stop on the South Manchester Line on the light-rail Metrolink network in Greater Manchester, England. It serves the South Manchester suburb of Didsbury.