I generally don’t prefer full English breakfast. But I knew I had to do it at Holywell House. And yes, it was a thing of beauty: thick fries, fatty sausage, delicious eggs; coffee, milk and sugar in shiny silver containers. Lez and Derek’s Victorian stay was a full B&B (first in Channel 4) Four in One Bed, no less), channels the thespian owners’ shine through every shade of paint and ornament. It wasn’t minimalist, it was gorgeous.
There was no accommodation on the world’s first package tour, but if there had been, Holywell would have been the first choice. The bed and breakfast is directly opposite Loughborough Southfields Park, where Thomas Cook brought his first organized party by train from Leicester in July 1841; it’s a modest ten-mile adventure. History has been made.
So what does this Leicestershire town have to offer tourists today? I was coming to find out. Lez and Derek had gotten things off to a good start. Later, while in Southfields Park, I caught a visitor attraction of a more modern kind: Loughborough’s new augmented reality trail, which reveals the town’s heritage through 15 interactive whiteboards. I scanned the billboard in the park (unsurprisingly about Thomas Cook) and followed my smartphone towards the city, checking the QR codes.
There were a few teething problems but after an hour or so I learned about everything from Ladybird Books (founded here) to the sock industry (the reason for the town’s Sockman statue) and the Loughborough Fair held in November. The country’s oldest and largest traveling fair.
But I found my own way to the Generator, the Old College of Art building. Thanks to tremendous volunteer efforts and Town Deal funding, this 1930s icon is being transformed into a creative hub. Volunteer Jonathan Hale gave me a look around the hall, which once housed the university’s power generator, a huge, iron-beamed space that will be a glittering arts venue when the project is completed. The building’s hip café was already open and busy serving flat whites and sourdough to students and locals alike.
Thomas Cook and his crew arrived via the Midland Railway and a green plaque was unveiled at Loughborough Station last October to mark the occasion. But Loughborough’s other line, the Great Central Railway, is more entertaining. It was closed by Beeching in 1969, but the eight-mile section between Loughborough and Leicester North reopened from 1973; It is the UK’s only double-track mainline heritage railway and the only railway run by two full-size steam engines.
Andy Fillingham, the train driver, let me hop onto the footplate and pointed out all the gauges and whistles as I stared transfixed into the fiery maw of the engine; The stoker was shoveling coal in the back wagon. What I liked most, though, was the attention to detail: the station at Loughborough has been restored in 1950s style; Quorn station 1940s, Rothley 1912. (Lez told me in his spare time he played George VI during the railway heritage days.)
Volunteer Simon Bracewell took me to the cafe for some fried tea cakes. “People dress in their Sunday best to catch the lunch trains; others come to ride on the back of certain locomotives,” he explained. “It’s not just about the train journey, it’s the whole experience.”
In 2023, the carriages were modified for wheelchair users. The entire line will be 125 years old in March 2024 and celebrations are planned.
But Taylor’s is even older, ten minutes down the road. Founded in Loughborough in 1839, it is the last bell foundry in the UK and the largest in the world. Bells made here ring all over the world, from the 47 bells in Loughborough’s own Carillon Tower to the 16-tonne ‘Great Paul’ at St Paul’s and Asia’s heaviest bell at St Andrew’s Cathedral in Singapore. Taylor’s also secured Town Deal and National Lottery funding; This is II. It is helping to restore the Grade* listed building and improve the site’s visitor experience.
Because yes, you can tour this worksite, albeit incredibly carefully. The first instruction given by Jim Crabtree’s guide was: “Avoid touching anything: hot, hard, wet, may be sharp…”
There were people on the tour from as close as ten miles and as far away as Chicago; the latter included a young bell ringer inspired by the new ten ring Taylor installed in the University of Chicago’s Mitchell Tower this summer. But even if you don’t know your Plain Bob from your Stedman Cinques, this is still a fascinating place to visit.
We literally walked into the foundry, which was in full swing. Men in overalls were moving pulleys, jingling chains, carrying planks, creating sparks. The only thing that separated us tourists from the workers was common sense.
Jim told us everything from different bell metals to how inscriptions were printed; Here in 1963, he demonstrated how all possible permutations on eight bells (40,320 in total) were rung and took 17 hours and 58 minutes – a world record.
In the oldest part of the factory, which looked like a scrapyard of sand and metal, we watched a man do something inside an upside-down bell, working it first with his hands and then with his arms; Soon he was half swallowed, his legs sticking out like a Bosch painting. “It starts to form the soil inside the bell,” Jim explained. “It takes about a week to make a mold for a bell this size. A Victorian process in a Victorian building. Nothing has changed.”
At the same time, the idea of bells uniting communities has not changed. As we walked through the foundry, we saw the newly cast Bell of Hope. A monument in the town’s Queen’s Park will be erected in 2024 to commemorate Covid victims. Another reason to book a package to this oldest pioneer of tourism.
Fundamentals
Holywell House (01509 731894; holywellguesthouse.com) has bed and breakfast options from £100pn.
For information on the Heritage Trail see loveloughborough.co.uk.
Great Central Railway (01509 632323; gcrailway.co.uk) offers Day Runabout tickets from £23 adult/£12 child; Check the website for the schedule.
Taylor’s Bell Foundry tours run on limited dates and cost adult £12.50 / £10.50 concession/child £8.50; Pre-booking is essential (01509 638500, belltrust.co.uk). See also loughboroughbellfoundry.org.