Sandstone, stories and local flavour
Lodsworth
A South Downs village shaped by community food, an unusual medieval liberty and paths into the wooded West Sussex landscape.
- Best for
- Local food, village history and country walking
- Give it
- A relaxed day, longer if you take the Cowdray circuit
- Don't miss
- The Temple of the Winds view on Black Down
The Fox verdict
A small village with a generous sense of place
Lodsworth pairs a community-run larder, village pub and local brewery with medieval stonework and rewarding walks.
The strongest visit combines the village's food and drink with St Peter's and a choice of landscape: a substantial Cowdray circuit, a shorter Black Down trail or the house and deer park at Petworth. Warm local stone and the story of the Liberty of Lodsworth give the compact settlement a character of its own.
Where to go
Places in Lodsworth
Every place below is checked against a published source, listed with what it is and how long to give it.
Local signatures
3 placesLodsworth Larder
A community-run shop in an award-winning timber building, bringing everyday groceries together with local produce, bakery goods, meat and artisan cheese.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: around 25 minutes
- Locality
- Lodsworth village
Lodsworth Village Hall Recreation Grounds
Village recreation grounds with a tennis court, sports fields and a children's playground, set behind the hall that opened in 2000.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: around 45 minutes
- Locality
- behind Lodsworth Village Hall
Cowdray Estate, Lodsworth and Selham Circular
A moderate, largely flat circuit through the Cowdray estate and golf course, Lodsworth, Selham and Ambersham, returning beside the River Rother.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: around 240 minutes
- Locality
- Cowdray, Lodsworth, Selham and Ambersham
Food & drink
2 placesLangham Brewery Taproom & Courtyard
A brewery and taproom in a restored 18th-century granary barn, using water drawn from beneath the building and producing cask, keg and canned beers.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: around 75 minutes
- Locality
- The Granary, Langham Lane
- Access
- Check the Official site before travel if a taproom visit is important.
The Hollist Arms
Lodsworth's village pub has a bar, snug, restaurant, tables on the green and a raised rear garden, with food and changing Langham ales.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: around 90 minutes
- Locality
- beside the small green
Walks & outdoors
1 placeBlack Down Temple of the Winds Trail
An easy heath-and-woodland circuit to the curved Temple of the Winds stone seat and broad views across the West Weald and the Downs.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: around 75 minutes
- Locality
- Black Down
- Access
- Dogs are welcome on leads because livestock graze here.
History & heritage
2 placesThe Parish Church of St Peter
A Grade II* church with a 13th-century nave and west tower, 14th-century chancel and a conspicuous neo-Norman window from the 19th-century rebuilding.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: around 35 minutes
- Locality
- Lodsworth village
- Access
- Check before travel if an interior visit is important.
Petworth House and Park
A 17th-century house with works by Turner, Van Dyck, Reynolds and Blake, alongside pleasure grounds and a 700-acre Capability Brown deer park.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: around 180 minutes
- Locality
- Petworth
- Access
- Check the Official site before travel when planning house and park access.
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Three ways to explore Lodsworth
Signature outings
Stonework at St Peter's
Trace the church from its 13th-century nave and tower to the conspicuous neo-Norman window added during the 19th-century rebuilding.
The Temple of the Winds
Follow an easy circuit through Black Down's heath and woodland to the curved stone seat overlooking the West Weald and Downs.
A Petworth afternoon
See works by Turner, Van Dyck, Reynolds and Blake before exploring the pleasure grounds and Capability Brown deer park.
The village story
Lodsworth Village Guide
Community enterprise, old stone, generous food and walks into the wooded Downs.
Local provisions and brewing
The Lodsworth Larder is a purpose-built timber shop, designed by Val Hinde and built with the woodsman Ben Law, and it won a Sussex Heritage Award in 2010. It is community-run, does a few Post Office jobs and pours takeaway coffee, and its shelves carry local asparagus, seasonal vegetables, bakery goods, meat and artisan cheese alongside the ordinary groceries. The named suppliers read like a directory of the surrounding country: Goodwood Dairy, Young's Butchers, Sødt Bakery, Trefoil Farm, Hennings Wines, Chilgrove Gin and the local Langham Brewery. Since 2026 you can also order a fish box from Johnson's of Portsmouth.
Langham brews half a mile away, at The Granary on Langham Lane, in a restored 18th-century granary barn where it has worked since 2005. The water comes from beneath the building. Charlie is the head brewer, and the taproom and courtyard pour the cask ales, the hop-forward Hip Hop golden ale and the lower-strength Voyager beers. Its beers are served at the pub as well.
The village table and the Liberty
The pub is the Hollist Arms, which faces the small green and describes itself as "a destination pub disguised as a village local." There is a bar, a snug, a restaurant, function rooms, tables out on the green and a raised garden behind. Dogs are welcome. The kitchen batters its fish and chips in Langham beer, and the rest of the menu runs from a chicken-liver parfait and French onion soup to a bacon-and-cheddar burger, a slow-cooked lamb sandwich, wholetail scampi and a kale-and-quinoa vegan burger. At weekends there is slow-grown Sussex free-range rotisserie chicken with skinny fries and spiced slaw; on Sundays the roast comes family-style — chicken, beef, pork or a vegetarian nut roast, with roast potatoes, Yorkshire puddings and vegetables. The building is on record in a 1425 charter and is thought to have become an inn around 1630, under a run of names — The Crown, Mants, the Poyntz Arms — and kept a blacksmith's forge going until 1945.
The old village sits around Church Lane and Vicarage Lane and is 13th-century in origin; The Street, the "new village," is largely 16th-century. The houses are built of rough local sandstone and Lodsworth stone, which gives the place a warm, stony colour. The illustrator E. H. Shepard spent his last years here, at Woodmancote. In 1119 Henry I confirmed a grant and exchange by Richard de Belmas, Bishop of London, that created the Liberty of Lodsworth, a private jurisdiction local historians say lasted until 1536; the manorial gallows stood on the rise still called Gallows Hill.
Church stone and open country
St Peter's, Grade II*, has a 13th-century nave and west tower, a 14th-century chancel, and transepts and aisles added in the 19th century. Inside there is a plain font and a conspicuous neo-Norman window in the south transept.
The walking is good in every direction. A nine-mile circuit from Cowdray loops through the estate and its golf course, Selham and Ambersham and back beside the River Rother, largely flat, with a pause at the Three Moles in Selham. For something shorter, Black Down lies to the north — an easy two-mile National Trust round through heath and woodland to the Temple of the Winds, a curved stone seat looking out over the Weald and the Downs. Tennyson walked these hills. Dogs are fine on the lead, since livestock graze up there.
Arriving, lingering and remembering
Lodsworth sits north of the A272, midway between Midhurst and Petworth, with Petworth House and its Capability Brown deer park nearby in one direction and the Cowdray ruins in the other. The nearest railway stations are Haslemere and Pulborough; neither is in the village, so a car or taxi connection is normally needed. Back in the village, the hall opened in 2000 has recreation grounds behind it — a tennis court, playing fields, a children's playground and free parking.
In the churchyard at St Peter's stands the gravestone of William Morley, who died when the Titanic went down, cut alongside the names of his parents, James and Mary.
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A guide with a point of view
Written from research. Edited for real journeys.
Use the Official site links for live practical details, then use this guide for context, ideas and room to explore.
Sources
Every place on this page is checked against a published source. Each entry links the record we used and names who publishes it.
- Lodsworth Larder — lodsworthlarder.com operator, sector body or destination organisation
- Langham Brewery Taproom & Courtyard — langhambrewery.co.uk operator, sector body or destination organisation
- The Hollist Arms — thehollistarms.com operator, sector body or destination organisation
- The Parish Church of St Peter — historicengland.org.uk statutory register or public authority record not machine-readable; publisher restricts automated access
- Lodsworth Village Hall Recreation Grounds — lodsworth-pc.uk operator, sector body or destination organisation
- Cowdray Estate, Lodsworth and Selham Circular — discoversussex.org operator, sector body or destination organisation
- Black Down Temple of the Winds Trail — nationaltrust.org.uk national body or asset manager
- Petworth House and Park — nationaltrust.org.uk national body or asset manager