Canal-edge Staffordshire
Longsdon
A high-ground village above the Caldon Canal, with Arts and Crafts detail, waterside walks and two characterful pubs.
- Best for
- Canal walks, pub lunches and Arts and Crafts detail
- Give it
- An estimated half day, or longer with both walks
- Don't miss
- Gerald Horsley's fittings at St Chad's
Photo: AtticTapestry · CC BY-SA 4.0 · cropped
The Fox verdict
A small village with water-led days out
Longsdon works best as a quiet base for canal towpaths, Deep Hayes and an unhurried pub stop.
The village pairs St Chad's Arts and Crafts architecture with the Caldon Canal landscape below at Denford. A two-mile heritage walk, the woods, meadows and pools of Deep Hayes, and two contrasting country pubs give a modest place useful variety without turning it into a checklist.
Where to go
Places in Longsdon
Every place below is checked against a published source, listed with what it is and how long to give it.
Local signatures
3 placesThe Wheel
A traditional country pub with a real fire, Draught Bass, a rotating guest ale and a beer garden looking over the surrounding moorland.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 75 minutes for a meal or drink
- Locality
- Leek Road, beside Longsdon Memorial Hall
- Access
- Dogs are limited to the outside seating area.
Caldon Canal Heritage Walk
A roughly two-mile canal circuit passing old limekiln remains, the narrows of a former lift bridge and Denford Farm.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 75 minutes for the two-mile circuit
- Locality
- starting at the Hollybush Inn in Denford
- Access
- The mostly flat towpath includes a short minor-road section; the optional Deep Hayes extension is steeper and can be muddy.
Deep Hayes Country Park
A 60-acre country park of woods, meadows and pools, with parking, toilets, a picnic area and walking routes linking with the canal.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 90 minutes for one shorter loop
- Locality
- off the A53 at Longsdon
- Access
- The figure-of-eight walk can be split into two shorter loops.
Food & drink
1 placeThe Hollybush Inn
A canal-side pub converted from an old flour mill, with home-made food, real ales, a large rear garden and an outdoor play area.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 75 minutes for a meal or drink
- Locality
- Denford, beside the Caldon Canal
- Access
- Dogs are welcome on leads.
History & heritage
1 place
St Chads Church, Longsdon
A Grade II* church designed by Gerald Horsley, with a west tower and broach spire on the A53.
- Visit length
- Editorial estimate: Allow around 30 minutes
- Locality
- on the A53 in Longsdon
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Three ways to explore Longsdon
Signature outings
Arts and Crafts detail
Gerald Horsley designed St Chad's in a variation on Perpendicular Gothic and also designed its chancel gates and altar frontals.
Deep Hayes on foot
Explore a 60-acre mix of woods, meadows and pools on a figure-of-eight route that can be split into shorter loops.
A mill turned pub
The Hollybush occupies an old flour mill beside the Caldon Canal, with a canal-side garden and home-made food.
The village story
Longsdon Village Guide
Country pubs, canal paths and Arts and Crafts character on the edge of the Churnet Valley.
The Wheel and Its Moorland Garden
The Wheel's steak and ale pie comes with home-made chips, and the diners who review it on TripAdvisor go out of their way to specify that they're proper chips, as though the point needed making. The pub sits on Leek Road next to Longsdon Memorial Hall, open-plan bar seating around forty, a real fire going, Draught Bass on one pump and a rotating guest ale on the other.
The menu also runs to mixed grills, treacle pudding and a vegetarian bake for anyone not eating meat. The beer garden looks out over the surrounding moorland, and children are welcome in it until 9pm, though dogs have to make do with the outside seating rather than the bar. "Not lavish or posh," is how one TripAdvisor reviewer put it, "just a friendly local clean tidy pub with lovely staff and good food."
Pubs and Amenities, Past and Present
Down the hill at Denford, where the Caldon Canal runs, the Hollybush occupies a converted flour mill and does home-made food at lunchtime and again in the evening, with a proper Sunday roast. Timothy Taylor Landlord and Thwaites IPA are the regular pulls, dogs are allowed on leads, and the garden runs down toward the towpath.
There's no shop left in Longsdon itself, just the two pubs. A post office once operated at Ladderedge from 1888 and later opposite the church, but that's history now, not somewhere you can walk to.
Canal Walks and Deep Hayes
The village's third pub, the New Inn, hasn't poured a pint since 2008. It stands at the junction of Leek Road and Denford Road, closed and decaying. Leek resident Tom Burnett called it "hardly an inspiring advert for the area." A developer wants to demolish it for a farm shop and restaurant; the parish council said it would rather have four houses.
Walking here mostly follows water. The Caldon Canal's Leek Branch runs the towpath into town through a tunnel and past four Grade II-listed stone bridges, and a two-mile heritage walk from the Hollybush follows the canal past the ruined limekilns of the old Cheddleton Lime Company, with an extension into Deep Hayes Country Park — sixty acres of wood, meadow and pool off the A53, with a visitor centre. Denford's own name was recorded as "Derneford" in 1341 — a hidden or secret ford — which still fits a hamlet tucked into the valley, with a bridge across the brook there since at least 1529.
St Chad's and Longsdon's Origins
St Chad's stands on the A53, built in 1903–05 by the Arts-and-Crafts architect Gerald Horsley, who designed the chancel gates and altar frontals himself. The Victoria County History called it "one of the most complete gifts that the diocese of Lichfield has ever known."
Longsdon turns up first as "Over Longsdon" in 1278, one of twelve townships making up the ancient parish of Leek, and didn't become a parish in its own right until 1894.
Leek Links and Folk Night
Leek is a mile and a half up the A53, with markets on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. It lost its own station along with Wall Grange in neighbouring Cheddleton, which closed in 1956, so the nearest working mainline station is Blythe Bridge, about twelve miles by road.
On the third Wednesday of the month, the Hollybush puts on a folk night, and there's an outdoor play area for children the rest of the time.
Stay around Staffordshire
Make a longer stay of it
Travel Fox holiday homes around Staffordshire, linked directly to their property pages.
Cheddleton
Greenways House - Parking, Pool Table and Garden!
- Sleeps 10
- 4 bedrooms
Cheddleton
Lee House Cottage + Annexe
- Sleeps 19
- 8 bedrooms
Leek
Silkwood House | Boutique 4 Bed nr. Peak District
- Sleeps 8
- 4 bedrooms
Stoke-on-Trent
Heather's House
- Sleeps 6
- 2 bedrooms
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.
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Sources
Every place on this page is checked against a published source. Each entry links the record we used and names who publishes it.
- The Wheel — camra.org.uk operator, sector body or destination organisation
- The Hollybush Inn — hollybushleek.co.uk operator, sector body or destination organisation
- St Chads Church, Longsdon — achurchnearyou.com national body or asset manager
- Caldon Canal Heritage Walk — canalrivertrust.org.uk national body or asset manager
- Deep Hayes Country Park — staffordshire.gov.uk statutory register or public authority