I am always on a quest to find places that still have a variety of independent shops. I had heard good things about Knutsford in Manchester, so I planned a visit there recently.

It is only a small town with one main shopping street called King Street. It’s quite narrow with a few side streets leading off it. But still manages to host a variety of stores and the rather pretty Council offices and a restaurant. Even though I only had about 4 hours to spend in the town it gave me the feeling of being nicely self containted. There’s individual fashion shops, designer shoes, jewellers, card shops, wool stores, galleries, homeware, gift and antique shops.

We did manage a spot of lunch while we visited and stopped off at a lovely little place called the Knutsford Wine Bar. It was really busy for a Tuesday afternoon, which might well give the correct impression that the place is popular with locals and tourists alike.

In the afternoon I went into the most fantastic card shop called Church Hill Gallery. There was a very unique collection of cards on offer from some very talented designers, there was also some very mouth watering handmade papers. The shop itself has a very atmospheric feeling, which I’ve tried to capture in this picture, I bought a much needed diary while I was there.

I also spent some considerable time in a store called Fibre & Clay which is a knit studio and contemporary craft gallery.  Downstairs were two rooms full of beautiful crafts and accessories and upstairs were two rooms full of wool and cotton yarns.

I loved one of the window displays which included an old singer sewing machine and a couple of Julie Arkell characters.

So if you can, definitely add Knutsford as one of your places to visit this year, it’s certainly worth the trip.