Riverside Gardens, Dragons' Den, Oktoberfest - Issue #008
This week in Shrewsbury: the middle of town is nearly finished changing, a few local names have had a very good week, and doors are opening across the county in the fortnight ahead. Welcome to The Bridge.
Thanks for reading The Bridge — it is written here in Shrewsbury, and it is free for everyone.
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Ask what’s on today, this weekend or for the kids and it answers with the list and the links.
The Town This Week
Riverside Gardens is nearly ready to open
Riverside Gardens this summer. Photo: Shropshire Live.
The park going in between the River Severn and the Darwin Centre is nearly finished. Riverside Gardens is the first phase of the town’s Smithfield Riverside plan, built with £18.7m of Levelling Up money, and it opens in December.
The play area already has its climbing boulder — English limestone, basalt and granite, with locally sourced Grinshill sandstone through it. The new lift that will carry people down from Frankwell car park and the footbridge to the park is almost done. It all stands where the old Riverside shopping centre came down two years ago.
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What People Are Talking About
Soul Kitchen comes back from Dragons’ Den up 920%
Bella Acland. Photo: BBC.
Bella Acland started making instant soup at Battlefield Enterprise Park in 2024 and took it on to Dragons’ Den. She came away with £40,000 from guest dragon Susie Ma for 15% of the business.
Since filming, sales are up 920%, nearly half a million soups have gone out, and Soul Kitchen sits in more than 100 independent shops. A noodle range arrives in October.
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Someone Worth Knowing
Shannon Johnson, who took on the Burlton Inn at 30
She took over the Burlton Inn, out on the A528 between Shrewsbury and Ellesmere, in June. It is the first pub of her own, though she had managed the same building under the previous tenants, and trade is building.
Six en-suite rooms and the kitchen carry it, and the regulars are starting to come in from Cockshutt, Wem, Harmer Hill and Baschurch. “You start to really get to know them and their lives,” she says, “and that is really lovely.”
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What’s On · Festival
Shropshire Oktoberfest returns with a silent disco and a comedy club
In the Quarry, on Friday 2 – Saturday 3 October · Friday 5pm–10pm, Saturday 12pm–10pm
→ Get tickets · + Add to calendar
Shropshire Oktoberfest. Photo: Love Shrewsbury.
Marquees and tipis go up for it, and the brewers, distillers and cider makers pouring inside are the local ones. There is a live stage, a silent disco, carpool karaoke, street food, and a comedy club on the Saturday with Daliso Chaponda and Mandy Muden.
It has run since 2017 and the organisers call it Shropshire’s biggest party. Costumes encouraged — there are prizes for the best dressed.
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What’s On · Harvest
Weston Park holds its first Harvest Hoedown
At Weston Park in Shifnal, on Saturday 10 – Sunday 11 October · 10am–4pm
→ Get tickets · + Add to calendar
Weston Park. Photo: Stay Shropshire.
The estate’s first harvest festival is built for families: bluegrass bands and line dancing, artisan makers, street food, and the walled kitchen garden’s own produce cooked up in the Granary.
Advance tickets are £10 and under-16s go free. Online sales stop at 9am on the morning of each day; after that it is standard admission at the gate.
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So that is the fortnight: marquees in the Quarry on the Friday, and Weston Park’s first harvest weekend the Saturday after. Both are better for the company.
Every event in town, one message away.
What’s on in Shrewsbury whenever you ask — tonight, the weekend, something for the kids. For anyone, and free.
1. Start the chat — One tap — the first message is already written for you.
2. Add your interests — Music, walks, the kids, the theatre — and how often you want to hear.
3. Ask, get answers that fit — What’s on tonight? Anything this weekend? It answers for you.
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Babies & Toddler
The Princess Royal opens its maternity doors to parents
At the Princess Royal in Telford, on Saturday 3 October · 10am–3pm
→ See details · + Add to calendar
The Princess Royal Hospital. Photo: Shropshire Live.
Expectant parents get to walk the unit before the day it matters: guided tours of the antenatal, labour and postnatal rooms, midwives and maternity support workers taking questions, and stalls on care before and after a baby arrives.
Free, with free parking, and children are welcome — though they cannot join the tours.
Wildlings runs wild play at The Cut every Wednesday
At The Cut on Abbey Foregate, on Wednesday 30 September · 10.30am–12pm
→ See dates · + Add to calendar
The Shropshire Wildlife Trust runs Wildlings at its visitor centre: an hour and a half outdoors for nought to five year olds, building dens, jumping in puddles and finding things that move. It runs every Wednesday in term time, next one this week.
Toddler Takeover hands the trampoline park to the under-sixes
In Battlefield Enterprise Park, on Mondays and Fridays in term time · 10am–12pm
→ Book a session · + Add to calendar
AirHop clears the whole park for one to six year olds twice a week: two hours of trampolines with the big children kept out, plus ride-ons, sensory toys and bubble time. £10.50 covers one child and one adult together.
Music Bugs brings its Friday singing to Greenfields
At Greenfields Bowling and Community Centre, on Fridays in term time · Family Bugs 9.30am, Baby Bugs 10.30am
→ Book a taster · + Add to calendar
Music Bugs runs its Shrewsbury classes on Fridays: Family Bugs at 9.30 for mixed ages, Baby Bugs at 10.30 for the ones not walking yet. Both are forty minutes of rhymes, knee-bounces and instruments, and new families can book a one-off taster where there is space.
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Pets
Vets now have to show you their prices. Since 23 September, practices must publish a full price list for consultations, common procedures and cremation, cap written prescription fees at £21, and tell you when a medicine is cheaper online. You can compare before you book. → Read on
The Shropshire Cat Rescue shop on Mardol. Photo: Shropshire Cat Rescue.
Shropshire Cat Rescue needs a few hours in its shop. The rescue has put out a plain call for help behind the counter — no experience needed, and a shift pays for food, vet bills and warm beds for the cats waiting on one. → Read on
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Holding It Together
Severn Hospice would like your kettle for October. Communi-tea Time is back: host a tea break, a coffee morning or a cake sale at home, at work or in the village hall, and the hospice sends a free pack with recipes, invitations, posters and bunting. Its teams care for around 3,000 people locally each year. → Read on
Four local bands, five pounds, one children’s hospice. Nathan Rowden has worked at Hope House for six years and runs the London Marathon next April, with more than £700 of his £3,000 raised. Saturday 10 October at LOOP on Castle Foregate: doors 4pm, £5, afterparty late. → Read on
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Town Wins
Shifnal Balti has a second national title in a month. Named Best Indian Restaurant 2026/27 at the British Curry & Catering Awards, weeks after Indian Restaurant of the Year at the Prestige Awards — thirty years on Broadway, and a manager who thanked Shifnal, Telford and Shrewsbury by name. → Read on
A Whittington seven-year-old grew a 12ft sunflower with 56 heads. Roman Davies was given a seed by his teacher at Whittington CofE Primary for a class competition. His was the only one that took, and he watered it day and night through the heatwave. → Read on
Boulton’s Artisan Butchery now carries Q Guild status. The Madeley shop has won the accreditation the trade compares to a Michelin star. Martin Boulton has been in butchery 45 years; the shop has traded in Madeley for five. → Read on
The rally came through town and the town wants it back. The Hills Ford Stages brought 150 crews to Shropshire for its first running, opened with a ceremonial start in the town centre that thousands watched. Organisers say hotels, pubs and restaurants had a busy weekend, and residents have already asked for it to return. → Read on
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Shrewsbury History This Week
Forty years since the Condover mammoths
At Norton Farm in Condover, on Saturday 27 September 1986
Eve Roberts, of Bayston Hill, was out walking her dogs when she saw a bone in the gravel at the quarry. More than 400 mammoth bones came out of it — the most complete adult skeleton found in Britain — and some of them are in Shrewsbury Museum now.
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Patrons & Sponsors
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Franci Capo — passionate lover of pizza at Shrewsbury Market