Stratford-upon-Avon
Shakespeare's birthplace on the River Avon, where Tudor timber, world-class theatre and gentle riverside walks come together.
Shakespeare's birthplace on the River Avon, where Tudor timber, world-class theatre and gentle riverside walks come together.
It would be easy for a town so closely tied to one name to rest on its laurels, but we have never found Stratford-upon-Avon to feel like a museum piece. The half-timbered houses and Georgian shopfronts still front a working market town, the Royal Shakespeare Company's theatres sit right on the river, and on any given evening you can walk from a play that is four centuries old into a town that feels thoroughly alive. It is about fifty minutes from the cottage by car, which makes it an easy day out or an evening at the theatre, and it is the sort of place we happily go back to more than once in a season.
We usually start with the Shakespeare houses. The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust looks after three properties open to visitors, and a single ticket covers all three. Shakespeare's Birthplace on Henley Street is the obvious starting point, a timber-framed house furnished to evoke the 1570s where he was born and grew up. New Place, a short walk away, is where he lived for the last nineteen years of his life; the house itself is long gone, but its footprint is now a thoughtful garden. Anne Hathaway's Cottage, out in Shottery a mile or so to the west, is the thatched farmhouse where his wife grew up, wrapped in cottage gardens and orchard. Two other Trust properties, Hall's Croft in the town and Mary Arden's Farm at Wilmcote, are used as learning spaces and no longer open for general visits, so it is worth planning around the three that are.
The Royal Shakespeare Company is the reason many people come, and rightly so. Its two main stages, the Royal Shakespeare Theatre and the smaller, more intimate Swan, sit side by side on the bank of the Avon, and the programme runs well beyond Shakespeare into new writing and the wider classical repertoire. We would book ahead for anything in summer or the autumn season, and it is worth timing a visit so you can climb the tower for the view over the town, or have a drink on the terrace before the lights go down. The programme changes every season, which is a large part of why the town rewards a return.
Down at Holy Trinity Church, a short riverside walk from the theatres, Shakespeare is buried beneath the chancel floor. His grave is marked by the famous inscription that curses anyone who moves his bones, and the church itself, set among lime trees on the water, is one of the loveliest in the county whether or not you care about the poetry. From there the Avon is at its best: you can hire a rowing boat, take a short river cruise, or simply follow the towpath and the Bancroft Gardens as narrowboats work through the lock. On a warm afternoon it is as good a way as any to let a day in the town slow down.
A full Stratford day works nicely: the houses and the church in the morning, lunch in the town, a matinee or an evening show, and the drive home back through Shipston and the villages once supper is done. If you would rather stay closer to home, some of our favourite country pubs sit between the cottage and the town, and there are gardens and houses to break the journey.
All of this on the doorstep, and your own thatched cottage to come home to. Sleeps seven, less than a mile from Soho Farmhouse.