CLIFFE House, which owns and operates seven nurseries in Bradford and Leeds, including Burley-in-Wharfedale, Baildon, Shipley, has completed a £300,000 refurbishment of its Pudsey nursery, leading to the creation of 15 new jobs.

It will also provide the opportunity for apprentices to gain early years childcare qualifications through its training academy, which also offers paediatric first aid qualifications for its nursery teams.

As part of the refurbishment, it has created four different ‘age and stage’ rooms which are natural and holistic in their approach, as well as a private, large outdoor area for the children to develop their gross motor skills by learning through play.

The Pudsey nursery is the newest addition to the Cliffe House group, having been purchased as a going concern in January 2020.

Originally starting in Yeadon in 1998, husband and wife team, Adrian and Della Stocks, have grown Cliffe House to six further nurseries in Horsforth, Bramhope, Burley-in-Wharfedale, Baildon, Shipley, and Pudsey.

Offering a total of 650 places to children, Cliffe House has been recognised by Day Nurseries.co.uk as one of the top 20 day nurseries in the UK, for the second year running, with the Burley-in-Wharfedale nursery ranking in the top 20 individual nurseries. Three of the nurseries have received ‘Outstanding’ Ofsted ratings, with the others achieving ‘Good’ ratings.

Adrian is proud of what he and Della have achieved over the last 25 years.

He said: “As working parents, we wanted to create a nursery where our children would be cared for in a safe and stimulating environment. A place where they could learn and progress through play, and where we had every confidence in a reliable, approachable, inspiring, and trusted team. Priorities that are still at the heart of all we do at Cliffe House today.”

Manager of Cliffe House Pudsey, Emma Bakes, said: “The nursery looks really bright and welcoming for the children and we’ve received some fantastic comments from the parents about the new inspiring areas and learning zones. It has also resulted in us attracting lots of new children from the area whose parents are really impressed with the new look.”

Della added: “We pride ourselves on the home-from-home environment we have created across all our nurseries with great outdoor spaces where the children can get close to nature and play outside.

“Promoting positive health and well-being is really important, not only for our nursery children but our employees too, some of whom have been with us since we started. That’s because we invest in the team by providing them with top quality training across all areas from mental health to first aid. We also know how to enjoy ourselves too with regular team events!”