Tideswell (local nickname “Tidser”) has the prosperous, urban air of a small town. The Peak District village is perhaps best known for its magnificent parish church of St John the Baptist, known with some justification as ‘the Cathedral of the Peak’, and described by Sir John Betjeman as “a grand and inspiring church”.
Things to do in Tideswell
The present 14th-century Decorated-style church is a stately building with a wonderfully light and airy chancel, and is a rarity among parish churches in that it was almost entirely built within one period – in about 70 years from 1300. This gives the elegant, cruciform church a wonderful uniformity of appearance, missing from so many other churches. Only the impressive turreted and pinnacled west tower was added later, in the newly-fashionable Perpendicular style.
The right to hold a market at Tideswell was granted early as 1251, and at one time, Tideswell held five markets a year for cattle and local produce. Those days are recalled in the name of the restored cobbled Pot Market, near the church.
Tideswell hotel
Among a range of other interesting, mainly 18th century, buildings which grace the village is The George Hotel near the church, which dates from the latter years of that century and features the then-fashionable Venetian-style louvered windows.
Tideswell walk
A short walk just to the south of the village is Tideswell Dale, a Derbyshire Wildlife Trust Nature Reserve which is noted for its beautiful flowers and exposures of columnar basalt rocks.
