Great Easton lies in the Welland Valley and is characterised by honey-coloured stone houses and locally quarried ironstone. One distinctive feature of the village is its jitties: these connect the streets within Great Easton. There are also historic buildings, traces of earlier work and medieval field remains. This makes it possible to focus a stay on village architecture and landscape history, rather than on individual buildings alone.

Church and historic houses

The parish church of St Andrew dates mainly from the 13th century and was built from local ironstone. Its west tower dates to the late 13th century and contains a small section of Norman herringbone masonry. The church thus combines two distinct clues to its building history: its predominantly medieval origins and an older architectural detail in the tower.

The history around the church reaches back a long way too: Iron Age pottery and a Romano-British site provide evidence of Great Easton's long history. The oldest surviving houses in the village date from around 1500. Furleigh Cottage, from the 15th century, is one of the oldest buildings; the Old Post Office probably dates from the late 16th century. These approximate dates and the different buildings show that the village's history cannot be reduced to a single period.

Other houses tell stories of crafts and earlier work. Stonewalls is a house dating from 1694 that once belonged to one of the village's bakeries. Clock House is a red-brick Victorian villa built in 1881. The original workshop of the village clockmaker adjoins it on the left. The former building at 19 Crossbank opened in 1908 and was a corset factory for more than 50 years; it is now privately occupied. The corsets made in Great Easton were crafted by hand. A considerable proportion were made by home workers in neighbouring houses.

The Great Easton Heritage Trail starts at the War Memorial in the village centre. This gives you a clearly identified starting point if you want to explore the village's history. The buildings and the history of its traditional crafts offer different points of interest, from construction methods and the former uses of individual houses to corset-making.

Ironstone and the landscape around Great Easton

Ironstone shapes both the character of the village and its houses. Alongside the many honey-coloured stone houses, traditional roofing materials in Great Easton include Collyweston stone slates, roof tiles, thatch and Welsh slate. These differences can be seen in the built environment, and not all roofs are made from the same material. The fields also matter if you want to look beyond the village: medieval ridge-and-furrow earthworks survive around Great Easton. These long, raised ground formations point to a different dimension of history than the individual houses.

A nearby landscape feature, Eyebrook Reservoir, lies one mile north of Great Easton. It is an important wildlife refuge. The village setting therefore offers a choice between its built history and the surrounding landscape as different aspects of a stay.

In the surrounding area, a private road runs from Great Easton via Caldecott Road to a fishing hut. The road is open to anglers only; day permits are available at the hut. Check the current rules before travelling. This information is relevant to anglers and should be distinguished from general impressions of the village and landscape.

Discover more destinations: Sapcote, Ashby De La Zouch, Market Harborough, Appleby Magna, Buckminster, Markfield, Sutton Cheney, Woodhouse Eaves.

For the regional travel overview: Leicestershire.