Stamford Quotes from Travellers, Writers, and Filmmakers

For centuries, Stamford (Lincolnshire) has been a magnet for praise— inspiring everyone from 17th-century travellers to modern day journalists and TV producers. Here are some notable quotations about the town.

Travellers (17th–18th centuries)

“As fine a built town all of stone as may be seen… not very large but finer than Cambridge.”
— Celia Fiennes, 1697

“From hence we came to St. Martins, and stopp’d at the George, out of Curiosity, because it is reckoned one of the greatest Inns in England.”
— Daniel Defoe, A Tour thro’ the Whole Island of Great Britain (1724)

“The most elegant town upon the Great Northern Road.”
— 18th-century epithet recorded by the Royal Commission

Nineteenth and twentieth cultural figures

“The finest stone town in England… the finest sight on the road between Edinburgh and London.”
— Sir Walter Scott

“Among stone-built towns there may be some that equal, none I think that surpass Stamford… it certainly chooses the supreme, architectural moment.”
— Lady Wedgwood (1936)

“The English country market town par excellence.”
— Nikolaus Pevsner

“Its mood is quiet; its colour mainly a pale buff-grey, reticent. But it has great dignity.”
— Alec Clifton-Taylor, Six English Towns

“England’s most attractive town.”
— John Betjeman

W. G. Hoskins’ celebrated word-picture (1951)

“If there is a more beautiful town in the whole of England I have yet to see it. The view of Stamford from the water-meadows on a fine June evening… is one of the finest sights that England has to show. The western sunlight catches the grey limestone walls and turns them to gold. It falls on towers and spires and flowing water, on the warm brown roofs of Collyweston slates, and on the dark mass of the Burghley woods behind… to the noble tower and spire of St Mary’s, the central jewel in the crown of Stamford.”
— W. G. Hoskins, East Midlands and the Peak (1951)

Press & media

“For all the picture-postcard perfection of its 600 listed buildings… our inaugural winning location remains a genuine and down-to-earth spot… Stamford has been spared the hipster invasion… Its pleasures tend towards the traditional.”
— The Sunday Times, Best Places to Live (2017)

“The ducks are quacking and the river sparkles in the spring sunshine… The architecture and honey-stone streets really are magnificent.”
— The Sunday Times (2013)

“The Cotswolds without the cars… giving those lovely stone houses and rolling hills.”
— The Sunday Times, Best Places to Live (2013)

“Stamford’s historic centre is an un-spoilt Georgian gem.”
— The Telegraph (2017)

“Clusters of churches, mazy passageways and twisting thoroughfare give it the air of a condensed Oxford or Cambridge transposed to a leafy fold in Lincolnshire.”
— The Guardian (2025)

“Growing up… I thought it was completely normal to play near a priory that was 1,000 years old… I ate a cheese cob where Boudicca had ridden through on some campaign.”
— Rae Earl, The Guardian (2013)

TV Producers and locations

“When we were planning the programme we presumed we would have to film all over the country… But then our researchers came back and told us they had found this marvellous town that had everything… I took one look and knew they were right. Stamford is beautiful. Extraordinary. It’s absolutely stunning.”
— Louis Marks, BBC producer of Middlemarch (1993)

In 1993 the BBC used Stamford as the setting for George Eliot’s Middlemarch, joining a long list of films and series that have turned to the town—and to nearby Burghley House—when they need a ready-made period backdrop.

Click through for a run down of Stamford (or nearby) based TV and Film productions and celebrity sightings.

Also views -> Facts about Stamford