Pictures of Malpas

About Malpas

This is an attractive small rural town on the course of the old Roman road from Whitchurch to Chester. It spreads itself down a hillside from the medieval Church dedicated to St.Oswald which was built mainly during the 14th and 15th-centuries.

Malpas is a pleasant Cheshire town showing some lovely black and white timber-frame houses and cottages. You can also find stately houses with good examples of medieval brickwork, and several old inns. Much of the town dates from the 16th and 18th-centuries, its old buildings include a pillar-fronted market hall and an old cemetery with a quaint building which has a tiny clock tower looking out over graves and tombs of centuries.

Without doubt the town's treasure is its church, this is built of rich red sandstone with good examples of fine medieval work. There are gargoyles of various creatures, windows with fine tracery and monuments to the Cholmondeley family of the nearby estate. Also in the church is the sculpted tomb of Randolphus Brereton dressed in the armour of a Tudor knight.

The Brereton's were prominent in Malpas, their seat, Brereton Hall was mentioned in the Doomsday Book and is one of the county's finest mansions. Sir Randle Brereton was a great benefactor of Malpas, he founded a grammar school in 1528, endowed a hospital, founded a chantry of St.George and presented a bell for the church tower.

Malpas lies within the shadow of the Peckforton Hills, is close to Tarplorley and the Delamere Forest, with Tilston and Tushingham being within easy reach. There is access to Chester races or Bangor on Dee race course, several golf courses and fishing. It is good cycling countryside and boating is one of the pleasures of the nearby Shropshire Grand Union Canal. Cholmondeley Castle and Garden, is well worth visiting, it is one of the regions top tourist attractions.

There are ample shops in the area, together with hotel and guest house accommodation, and scattered holiday cottages can be found tucked away in quiet parts of the town, or in the beautiful surrounding countryside.