Suffolk
Hasells Courtyard, Long Melford
Long Melford is one of Suffolk’s most picturesque villages with its long high street and thatched houses, surrounded by Constable’s glorious countryside. During the 15th century, the market town prospered from the wool trade. The magnificent almshouses, Trinity Hospital, the church of The Holy Trinity - one of the most beautiful of Suffolk’s “wool churches” - and the fine Tudor mansions of Melford Hall and Kentwell Hall all date from this period. To-day Long Melford, now famous as an antique centre (popularized by the television series “Lovejoy”), offers a wealth of good shops, inns and cultural opportunities. It is a very special place to live. There are frequent buses to Sudbury (4 miles) and Bury St. Edmunds (10 miles) and trains to London from Sudbury, via Marks Tey (1½ hours).
Northfield Court, Aldeburgh
Aldeburgh is the story of the Suffolk coast line and its battle with the sea. By 1500 the town, despite losing six streets to the sea, was emerging as a port and its prosperity grew. Fishing and boat building are still the foundations of the town and both trades still thrive. The sailing boats dotted along the river at one end of the town, the fishing huts, sheds and working boats scattered about the beach at the other, all carry on as they have for years, providing endless subject matter for painter and photographer alike.
The composer Benjamin Britten settled here and his opera Peter Grimes was inspired by local poet George Crabbe and the town itself. In 1948 he and tenor Peter Pears founded the Aldeburgh Festival, transforming the disused malthouses in nearby Snape into a concert venue of international standing. Aldeburgh now hosts a year round program of musical events.
The town is surrounded by places of interest. The Martello tower and Moot Hall (now a museum) in the town; the coastal forests of Tangham, Tunstall and Dunwich; the Norman castles at Framlingham and Orford; romantic Leiston Abbey and the Blything Union Workhouse chapel at Bulcamp are all monuments of national and local history. The bird sanctuary at Minsmere provides a fascinating experience for ornithologists, with its avocets, bearded tits, bitterns, marsh harriers, nightingales and a wealth of other varieties, both visitors and native.
Aldeburgh has a wide selection of shops, galleries, inns, restaurants and hotels as befits this delightful, unspoilt, residential seaside town – as well as a good golf course and small cinema. London is approximately 100 miles. Trains from Saxmundham, 6 miles, go to London Liverpool Street: time 2 hours.