A walk around Bewdley I

   To the West Midlands at the weekend and a visit to family in Bewdley, Worcestershire, a small town nestling (mainly) on the east bank of the river Severn.  A popular resort for day-trippers from Birmingham and the Black Country.  Its heyday seems to have been in the Late Middle Ages: Leyland wrote of the town that it 'glittereth, being all of new buildings'. The prosperity continued, modestly, until the Industrial Revolution, when it got over taken by its neighbours such as Kidderminster.

   The old town in a tight network of narrow, mainly Georgian, streets squeezed between the river and steep hills immediately to the west. The result is delightful and very picturesque, but traffic is an issue.  Flooding too is a danger for home owners on the two quays that run north and south of the bridge. Pevsner considered it the most perfect of all Georgian small towns in Worcestershire. The bridge, which is suitably both sturdy and elegant, is by Thomas Telford 1795-8. It cost £9,000.