Fittleworth

The Inn Where Pictures Paid the Bill

The panelled dining room at The Swan Inn still hangs paintings that guests left in place of paying. Turner and Constable were among the artists who stayed here and sometimes settled their bills in artwork, and the walls have kept the habit. The inn goes back to the late fourteenth century, and its written record begins in 1536, when royal couriers changed horses in the yard. Rudyard Kipling signed the visitor book over three days in July 1901. In 1924 a man named Bert Temple founded the Ancient Order of Froth Blowers, and its first meeting was held here.

The Swan is still the village pub, with a bar, a forty-six-cover dining room, a barn and twelve bedrooms. The kitchen keeps to classics: ploughman's with farmhouse cheddar, seasonal suet-crust pies, grilled day-boat fish, Sussex pond pudding. The lamb comes from Jeremy Way, who farms two miles away, and the honey from a local orchard. In summer the courtyard runs a wood-fired pizza kitchen among fruit trees, firepits and a boules pitch. Dogs are welcome on a lead inside; Michelin noted a friendly team, "but the even friendlier pub dog."

A Community Shop and a Ringing Tower

A few minutes away, Fittleworth Stores does the work of a shop, a café and a Post Office at once. The old village shop closed in 2011; this one opened in October 2018, community-owned, run by manager Toni with paid staff and volunteers. It stocks groceries from more than thirty local suppliers alongside village pottery, art and jewellery. The café turns out cooked breakfasts, bacon baps, sausage rolls, homemade cakes and Jengers Craft Bakery doughnuts, with its own coffee blend from Edge Tea & Coffee and Downsview Farmhouse ice cream. In 2024 it was named National Champion Village Shop and Post Office. A children's playground and playing field sit beside it.

The Parish Church of St Mary stands on Upper Street, its late-eleventh-century tower listed Grade I and topped by a broached shingled spire. Henry Woodyer rebuilt the nave in 1871. Canon Arthur Simpson, rector here from 1876 to 1900 and known for his work on bell tuning, increased the church's two medieval bells to a peal of six. A band still rings them.

Bridge, Mill and Elgar by the Rother

Below the village, the River Rother is crossed by Fittleworth Bridge, a scheduled monument whose southern three arches are sixteenth-century in origin, rebuilt between 1717 and 1739, and whose northern two arches were built in 1811. The mill nearby was a corn mill first recorded in 1246 and rebuilt in stone in 1623; Turner painted it as Fittleworth Mill on the River Rother. From 1917 Edward Elgar rented a seventeenth-century cottage here called Brinkwells, and it was at Fittleworth that he composed his Cello Concerto.

Greensand Walks and Nearby Treasures

Walking is one of the things Fittleworth does well. The Serpent Trail passes through on its way across the greensand, the stage from Petworth arriving through wood and heath, the next crossing the Rother by way of Hesworth Common, with its lowland heath and purple heather. Petworth House and its deer park lie nearby, as do the Roman mosaics at Bignor. Pulborough station is about five minutes by car, the A283 runs past the village, and the Stagecoach 1 threads between Petworth and Worthing.

One Last Evening in the Courtyard

On a summer evening, the pizza oven in the Swan's courtyard is still going among the fruit trees and firepits.