Where to Stay in Crewe, England

What is Crewe known for?

It is best known as a large railway junction and as the home of Crewe Works, for many years a major railway engineering facility for building and overhauling locomotives. Rolls-Royce motor car production ran here from 1946 until 2002, and the Pyms Lane factory on the west of the town builds Bentley motor cars. The Crewe Heritage Centre keeps that story.

Christ Church Tower, St Mary's Church, Crewe and St Barnabas' Church, Crewe stand among the parish landmarks of a town in Cheshire East.

What are the main landmarks in Crewe?

Crewe's listed buildings run heavily to churches. St Mary's Church, Crewe, St Peter's Church, Crewe, St Barnabas' Church, Crewe and the Union Street Baptist Church, Crewe cover the town, with Christ Church Tower left standing on its own. St Michael's Church, Coppenhall, St Michael and All Angels Church, Crewe Green, the Church of St Mary the Virgin, Wistaston and St Matthew's Church, Haslington take the villages.

The Christadelphian Hall and Shavington Hall are different things entirely. Crewe Heritage Centre, Firtree Cottage, Stowford and Magnolia Cottages, the Smithy and Smithy Cottage, 124, Crewe Road and 47, Delamere Street complete the listed record.

What is the history of Crewe?

Crewe is a railway town in the plainest sense, a civil parish in Cheshire East whose shape follows the junction and the workshops that grew beside it. Crewe Works did the building. For many years it was a major railway engineering facility, manufacturing and overhauling locomotives on a scale that gave the town its trade and its terraces.

Christ Church Tower survives from that period. St Mary's Church, Crewe, St Peter's Church, Crewe, St Barnabas' Church, Crewe and the Union Street Baptist Church, Crewe were built for the parishes the works created. Motor cars followed the locomotives: Rolls-Royce production ran at Crewe from 1946 until 2002, and the Pyms Lane factory on the west of the town builds Bentley motor cars.

The Crewe Heritage Centre records it. Around the built-up area the older settlements kept their own histories, and Wistaston, Haslington, Coppenhall, Crewe Green and Shavington each hold a church or a hall of their own. The Church of St Mary the Virgin, Wistaston, St Matthew's Church, Haslington and St Michael's Church, Coppenhall carry that older parish record.

Shavington Hall, Firtree Cottage, Stowford and Magnolia Cottages and the Smithy and Smithy Cottage survive among the lanes.

Where is Crewe?

Crewe sits in South Cheshire, a civil parish of the Cheshire East unitary authority, one hundred and fifty-eight miles north-west of London and well inland from either coast. Manchester lies twenty-eight miles north. Liverpool is thirty-one miles off, and Crewe stands south-east of its city centre.

Wistaston, Haslington, Coppenhall, Crewe Green and Shavington ring the built-up area, and the Pyms Lane factory occupies the west of the town.

What is the climate of Crewe?

Salt air never gets this far. South Cheshire keeps Crewe inland from either coast, so the temperate year comes without the moderation a shoreline gives, and the difference shows most across the colder months. Extremes stay rare all the same.

Walks out to Wistaston, Haslington or the lanes around Shavington Hall work through most of the year, and the Crewe Heritage Centre covers a wet afternoon.

How do you get to Crewe?

The railway is the reason: Crewe is a large railway junction, and arriving by train puts a traveller in the middle of the town rather than at its edge. London is a long run. One hundred and fifty-eight miles separate the two, while Manchester city centre lies twenty-eight miles north and Liverpool city centre thirty-one to the north-west.

The Pyms Lane factory sits on the west of the town, with Wistaston, Haslington, Coppenhall and Shavington on the lanes out.