Bury St Edmonds in General

I have only lived in Bury St Edmunds for 16 years, but it, more than any other place, is my home. I met my second husband, Sam here, both of my children met and married their partners here and I expect to remain here now for the duration. We actually moved to a little village about 10 miles outside of the town, six years ago, but we all work in the town and therefore, most of our lives are actually spent in Bury St Edmunds, fondly known as BSE.
...once, and in the local Bury Free Press, (which costs 32P and isn’t therefore free.) Most recently when the Rothschild and the Goldsmith sprogs tied the knot at St Mary's church, next to the Cathedral, last September. My daughter Rowena and her soldier boy Mack also got married at St Mary’s a month earlier. If they'd waited, they'd have been able to use the wonderful flowers, which extended to numerous bowers of white roses outside the church! These ... more

I have only lived in Bury St Edmunds for 16 years, but it, more than any other place, is my home. I met my second husband, Sam here, both of my children met and married their partners here and I expect to remain here now for the duration. We actually moved to a little village about 10 miles outside of the town, six years ago, but we all work in the town and therefore, most of our lives are actually spent in Bury St Edmunds, fondly known as BSE.
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BSE has been in the National papers more than once, and in the local Bury Free Press, (which costs 32P and isn’t therefore free.) Most recently when the Rothschild and the Goldsmith sprogs tied the knot at St Mary's church, next to the Cathedral, last September. My daughter Rowena and her soldier boy Mack also got married at St Mary’s a month earlier. If they'd waited, they'd have been able to use the wonderful flowers, which extended to numerous bowers of white roses outside the church! These were given away to onlookers after the ceremony, which was attended by royalty, and lots of famous people. St Mary's is a beautiful modified Norman church built in 1120. It’s full of stained glass windows and carvings. It is the largest in Suffolk and has the longest aisle in Europe. It is steeped in history, as is the town itself and many famous people are buried there including Henry VIII’s sister Mary Tudor
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Bury St Edmunds was originally known as Bedericsworth and was renamed after the remains of Edmund, the king of the East Angles was brought here in 869AD after he had been beheaded by invading Danes near Norwich. They built a shrine to him and 200 years later an Abbey was built around the shrine. This was dissolved in 1539 by Henry VIII and only ruins remain. Edmund was canonised and became St Edmund, hence the Bury of St Edmund. St Edmundsbury is the Mother Church of Suffolk but the Cathedral building is still being built, having been begun in 1503 and becoming a Cathedral in 1914 …that’s an awfully long time!
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Next to the Cathedral is the huge and imposing Abbey Gate, which is the entrance to not only the Cathedral itself, but also the Abbey Gardens and these are quite famous, having won the town many awards. The original Gate was Norman but was damaged in an uprising in 1327 and later rebuilt. It leads you to a large expanse of wonderfully laid out formal gardens and lawns, with a few more secluded areas called The Old English Garden, The Water Garden and The Blind Garden, this one is full of scents as you might expect.
You can find the ruins of the old Abbey among the gardens and I can feel the history around me when I touch the old stones. They emit an unmistakable aura of the past and are a constant reminder of our heritage.
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There are swans, ducks and geese to be found on the river Lark, at the edge of the Gardens and plenty of children’s play equipment for the younger visitors. You can also hire tennis courts and play bowls, hiring your equipment from the gift shop. Of course you can buy an assortment of gifts here, including many of local interest. There is also a tearoom, with tables outside on a sunny day, selling drinks and snacks. Entrance to the Gardens is between dawn and dusk and it is one of the rare activities nowadays that is free.
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The Cathedral also has it’s own gift shop selling items of local interest and of a religious theme and it also has a tea shop. You will find this to be a little more refined than the Gardens tearooms, but the prices are also higher. The Cathedral hosts lots of large exhibitions, concerts and events, and also gives frequent lunchtime concerts on Wednesdays, which is market day. Admission to these lunchtime sessions is always free too.
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There used to be more pubs than churches in this part of Suffolk and there may well still be.There are certainly more pubs in the centre of town than churches. There is one more church in the centre that I can recall, in St John’s Street, called St John’s church and it has a very imposing spire. This church is known for frequently hosting Free Trade and WI fairs on various weekdays. In this same street are two pubs, and, opposite to the church, a sex shop called Secrets.
One of these pubs, The Bushel, is opposite where I work and so is frequented by civil servants from both the Dept for Works and Pensions and the adjacent Inland Revenue. Despite this, it’s a pleasant place to visit, an old and very atmospheric pub with a separate restaurant area, an outside garden area, a pool table and an inexpensive menu. It's also very friendly. We have many pubs in the town centre alone, one of which, The Nutshell, is reputed to be the smallest in England and although I’ve had a drink outside of this pub, I’ve never been able to get inside it, as it’s always full, especially on market days. The building is very quaint and looks like something out of Dickens, but then, many of the building do.There are pubs galore in almost every street and they are all situated in old buildings, often with wonky walls, uneven floors and wooden beams on the ceiling, because all of the buildings in this historic town are very old. dating back to Norman times or earlier. Most of the pubs have modern interiors, but they all retain some of the ambiance of this place and all of them will offer something different.
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I’ve heard it said that there aren’t many shops in BSE. This is rubbish. Surrounding the large Art Gallery which is in the centre of town are the usual Woolworth, Boots, Jessops, WH Smith, Burton, Thornton, Iceland, Next, Mothercare, Argos, Superdrug, M&S, Size-UP, Ottaker, Palmer, MVC, Dixon, numerous shoe shops, butchers, card shops, jewellers, charity shops and toy shops. On the outskirts of town we have the larger supermarkets like Waitrose, Tesco and Sainsbury. We also have some pretty specialised shops, including the aforementioned sex shop. This is your usual adult videos, clothing, books and other adult toys. We have a Model shop selling not only actual models but the means with which to build your own models. There’s a Belgian chocolate shop which also sells sugar free liquorice, a dolls house furniture shop, a pawn shop, a second hand computer games shop, several mobile phone shops, a couple of specialised computer shops, a curtain exchange, an extreme sports shop, a fishing tackle shop, a carpet bag shop and a couple of second hand book shops….to name but a few. There is also a specialised tobacco shop where you can buy rich, aromatic mixtures to smoke in your pipe. This shop sells specialised coffee beans too and will grind them to your own mixture. I can spend an age just window-shopping in the town centre.
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I mentioned the markets. On Wednesdays there used to be a large cattle market, when a building in the middle of one of the main town car parks was filled with sheep, pigs and all manner of other animals being sold by the farmers hereabouts, but this has been stopped now, in favour of building a huge multiplex cinema complex just on the edge of town. The debate about this goes on. Meanwhile, every Saturday and Wednesday, in the central square, there is a market selling fruit and veg, speciality teas and coffees, cheap groceries, clothes, flowers, Cd's and almost anything you can imagine. This starts around 8 in the morning and if you visit late in the day, around 4pm, you can pick up many bargains as all the stallholders are trying to sell off their fresh produce before they have to pack up.
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There are also enough cafés and eating places to sink a battleship. Although we don't boast a Starbuck, there is a little coffee shop in St John's Street that sells the most delicious Java in huge cardboard cartons. It does all the usual lattes and flavours too but I can't be doing with that! Here you can also buy lovely sandwiches made with French sticks, and wickedly fattening pastries. There's also a café called The Bay Leaf in the same street where you can meet friends for a no frills but very tasty snack. There are a couple of specialised sandwich bars that will make whatever you want while you wait, to take away, and a bakery in Abbeygate street where you can not only buy freshly baked bread and pastries, but also sit and eat them. Harriet’s is an old fashioned café in the central square, where the waitresses dress in little black frocks with a white frilly apron (like the costumes you can buy in the sex shop). The waitresses, however, are hired for their skills in waitressing and not necessarily for their looks.
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We have a Burger King and a MacDonald (who doesn't) a Café Uno, a Pizza Hut, several Chinese, Indian, Tai, Greek restaurants including The Beefeater on Angel Hill who really do the best Greek food in the town. Sam loves the Sheftalia here. We have a small number of fish and chip shops and Peggottys, which is reputed to be the best seafood restaurant in Suffolk. (Not liking seafood, I haven't tried it) The newest restaurant opened two weeks ago and it’s called the Zen Noodle Bar. All of these places are in the centre itself, or in one of the small streets leading off.
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The most imposing building in the middle of all of this, is the building that houses the Art Gallery. It's called The Market Cross and has a considerable history. Much of the building and the town centre was destroyed in the Great Fire of 1608 and then rebuilt in 1620. It was used for the Duke of Grafton’s Company of Comedians until 1818 and in 1864 Liszt performed there. Now as well as featuring famous Suffolk artists like Constable and Gainsborough, it regularly shows work by new local artists.
BSE also has a Museum of Art and Horology in the 18th century restored Manor House Museum and a Museum of local history in Moyse’s Hall, an impressive Norman building. There is also a museum of brewing artefacts and techniques situated in the Green King Brewery, round the corner from St Mary’s Church, next to the main Police Station and Courtrooms. I expect that everyone has heard of the famous Green King beer, Abbot’s Ale which is the main brew on sale around here, although we do have one or two “real ale” pubs. It’s very strong in both taste and alcoholic content.
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Across the road from the brewery you can find the BSE Theatre Royal, a beautiful Georgian theatre run by the National Trust. It is small but perfectly formed with wonderful acoustics. I have been to see shows, pantomimes and plays there and Sam has performed there when he was a professional musician/singer before he met me, sadly. This place is well worth a visit.
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There is small cinema too next door to a Bingo Hall. I haven't sampled the cinema, but I can tell you that the Bingo hall serves food and drinks at very reasonable prices. The town also has a ten-pin bowling alley and several snooker halls and there are other sports facilities and horse riding on the outskirts. Night life exists, though it will be tame compared to the larger cities. There are three of four nightclubs and several specialist clubs, like the British Legion. Many of the pubs have live bands and/or karaoke in the evening.
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The highlight of the year is the Bury Festival in the summer. This is a full blown carnival with floats and a procession through the town ending at the Abbey Gardens. The Queen is chosen and crowned before the procession then paraded in one of the floats. The Gardens then are filled with fairground rides, stalls and music and it usually ends with a grand fireworks display. Later, in the autumn, the Gardens are filled with huge marquees when the Bury Beer Festival gets underway. This lasts for a complete weekend and you can sample not only the whole range of Green King ales but also a host of guest beers.
There have been many other Events in the Abbey Gardens, notably an Abba Festival with most of those attending in costume! There is a huge fireworks display here every Guy Fawkes Night too.
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The town has its own Leisure Centre situated only a fifteen minute walk from the town centre, and several beauty salons and hairdressers. There is a Fitness First Gym near to the railway station, a ten-minute walk from the centre. The Public Library is opposite the Bus Station, which is next to where I work, and again, only minutes away from the centre of town. The buses to outlying villages are fairly frequent, though there are not many services out of the town after 6pm. There is a bus connection direct to Stanstead. The town has a vast choice of hotels, guest houses and B&Bs to suit all budgets.
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I have tried to keep this review concentrated on the town of Bury St Edmunds itself, but there is an abundance of interesting places to visit in the outlying areas, including historical houses, castles and gardens, working windmills and watermills, animal parks and zoos, giant car boot sales and craft/antique fayres. There are also several RAF and USAF bases around the town, so aircraft enthusiasts would love it. I could go on and on, but I hope that I’ve made my point.
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Bury St Edmunds is well worth a visit. More info can be found at www.stedmunds.co.uk

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