A Summer in the U.K. Countryside Beach Town St. Ives
A weeklong stay in the English countryside conjures up visions of drinking a pint next to a warm hearth, or a stroll along a windswept heath.
Yet here, in the town of St. Ives, nestled into the steep Cornish cliffs and overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, my children were riding the waves in wet suits each morning, while I practiced yoga in a converted theater, sounds of the crashing swells drifting through the open windows. A branch of the Tate Museum stood so close to the beach that it cast a shadow on the sunbathers.
Dating from the Middle Ages, St. Ives is a labyrinth of cobbled alleyways lined with 19th-century stone fishermen cottages, working artist studios and galleries and a bevy of shops selling Cornish pasties and ice cream.
The town was once the domain of fishermen and tin and copper miners, but in 1877 the railroad arrived, bringing visitors, and particularly artists, who were drawn to its seascape, the craggy green nature walks and the famously clear light. Next year will be the 150th anniversary of the arrival of the railroad, as well as the 100th anniversary of Virginia Woolf’s “To the Lighthouse,” which was inspired by the Godrevy Lighthouse in St. Ives Bay, where she spent her summers as a child.
St. Ives has roughly 11,000 full-time residents, but in July and August, the population swells as tourists swarm Downalong, the oldest quarter and once home to the town’s many fishermen. Clustered on the neck of land between Porthmeor Beach and St. Ives Harbor, Downalong’s narrow one-way streets become so thick with pedestrian traffic as to make driving a car down them a feat of derring-do. Upalong is the neighborhood higher on the hills and farther inland, where the miners once lived.
Last June, just as the summer crush was picking up, my family arrived for a weeklong visit. Like many tourists, we opted to stay at one of the fishing cottages in Downalong that have been converted into vacation rentals. (Like many popular tourist towns, St. Ives has been contending with issues of over-tourism. In particular, the lack of affordable housing is a pressing issue.)
Our cottage dated to the 1800s and was once was home to Alfred Wallis, a fisherman and mariner who took up painting later in life. Wallis, who had no training and little money, began painting in his 70s, after the death of his wife, using discarded marine paints to create works on found objects, like the backs of train schedules or grocery boxes. He was discovered in 1928, when he was spotted by the modernist painters Ben Nicholson and Christopher Wood while painting at his kitchen table.
The Tate St. Ives, which opened in 1993 in a former gasworks building, its striking white rotunda stretching out over Porthmeor Beach, celebrates Wallis as well as Nicholson, Wood and other artists who lived in the area in the mid-20th century and are known as the St. Ives School. A key member was the sculptor Barbara Hepworth, and there is a museum and garden dedicated to her work as well.
While many of the town’s galleries focus on modernism, the St. Ives Museum looks further back. “St. Ives became internationally famous for the practice of landscape and marine painting long before the modernists arrived,” said David Tovey, an art historian, who noted that artists were drawn to the town’s mild climate, as well as that famed light. The light, Mr. Tovey explained, is in part the result of St. Ives’s position facing north on a peninsula, placing the sun behind the town for most of the day, its rays glinting off the water and its sandy beaches, as well as the stunningly clear and reflective St. Ives Bay.
Our mornings began at the St. Ives Surf School on Porthmeor Beach, where our kids took their first ever surf lessons. The calm water and smallish waves are a good starting point for beginners, and the lessons are popular and can fill up quickly.
After an hour paddling their surfboards through the freezing water — it is still England — the kids were famished, and we typically met for lunch at the nearby Porthmeor Beach Cafe. The restaurant offers a deck overlooking the water with a menu of Cornish crab sandwich and halloumi Caesar salad, as well as a boardwalk cafe with more casual fare; our kids, sandy in their bathing suits, typically went for a basket of fish and chips at the picnic tables.
Other local spots we frequented included St. Ives Bakery, where a line of hungry tourists often stood waiting for pasties and then found themselves guarding their lunch from trolling sea gulls, who brazenly steal from unsuspecting hands — something my son had to learn the hard way. Yellow Canary Cafe, which had excellent sandwiches, was another favorite.
Among the town’s many shops, one of the standouts was Sisters, a clothing boutique run by Elizabeth Gould and her sister Susie Nagle in a building that has been in their family since 1895. The space now sells clothes from small designers, including a line of colorful cardigans featuring fanciful patterns like tennis rackets and grapefruits, and a collection of bags and jackets that Ms. Nagle sews from found textiles, like tapestries and embroidery.
Long walks by the sea
At dinnertime, we often found ourselves at St. Eia, a wine bar featuring small plates of fresh local fish and produce. Named for the town’s patron saint, a fifth-century Irish princess said to have sailed across the sea on a leaf, St. Eia is owned by Eleanor Vening and her husband, Mark Quick, who grew up in St. Ives. The pair, who spent a decade working in restaurants in London before opening St. Eia in 2021, met when Eleanor’s family purchased a vacation home there two decades ago.
Most restaurants line Fore Street, a quick walk from Porthmeor Beach, and Wharf Road, which faces St. Ives Harbor. Wharf Road is clogged with pedestrians in the summer, many drinking pints in front of the Sloop Inn, believed to date from 1312. Still, the town’s harbor can make for a scenic stroll, particularly at low tide, when the water almost completely recedes, leaving boats marooned and enabling long walks over what was, hours earlier, the sea bottom.
One day we left early with ambitious plans to hike along the South West Coastal Path to Zennor, a beautiful village with a Norman church and the former home of the writer D.H. Lawrence, who finished writing “Women in Love” while living there. We began the walk energetically enough, delighted to discover fields of wildflowers and a shepherd and his dog wrangling a flock of wayward sheep.
But soon we were navigating narrow, rocky paths that clung to the high cliffs, precariously close to the roaring ocean below, our sneakers no match for the tough terrain. By the time we made it into the picturesque town, we collapsed at a picnic table at the 700-year-old Tinners Arms, grateful for bowls of chili and a helpful bartender who gave us the name of a taxi driver to take us home.
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