Whilst its history has been in its ecclesiastical and agricultural communities, Cartmel has since the mid-20th century developed as a minor tourist destination, being just outside the Lake DistrictNational Park.[1] Several attractions in the village, including Cartmel Racecourse and a Michelin-starred restaurant, cater to this tourist trade.
History
The name Cartmel means "sandbank by rocky ground", from the Old Norsekartr ("rocky ground") and melr.[2] The place-name is first attested in 677, when the Cartmel Peninsula was granted to St Cuthbert, whose influence may explain why by the Norman Conquest the village was known as Kirkby, a name indicating the location of a church.[3]
Agriculture was the chief industry of the area until the mid-20th century,[3] dominated by the lands of the Cavendishes, and remains an important part of the village. Nearby Grange-over-Sands eclipsed Cartmel as the biggest settlement on the peninsula in the 19th century, growing as a Victorian seaside resort[6] when the Furness Railway was built across the peninsula. Cartmel village is still served by a station in nearby Cark, opened in 1857 and called Cark and Cartmel.
Hospitality and tourism
Tourism has grown in the village since the middle of the 20th century. In 1923 Cartmel Priory Gatehouse became a museum for the Priory, and was used for exhibitions and meetings, before being presented to the National Trust in 1946. By 2011 it was mainly in private residential use, although the Great Room is opened to the public on several days a year.[7] The Priory itself is still the local parish church, but is open to visitors outside of service times.[8]
Cartmel Racecourse dates back to at least the 19th century, but grew in popularity when it became a National Hunt course after the Second World War. It started to attract major professionals in the 1960s, and now hosts nine meetings a year between May and August, the biggest traditionally in Whit Week.[9]
Writers who encouraged the growth of tourism to Cartmel include Lancashire dialect writer and BBC broadcaster Thomas Thompson, who wrote sixteen books on Lancashire people and their communities and was fond of Cartmel. The frontispiece in his 1937 book Lancashire Brew is 'Cartmel from an etching by Joseph Knight', the founder of the Manchester School of Painters. Later Alfred Wainwright dedicated a chapter to Cartmel Fell, about 7 miles (11 km) north of Cartmel, in his 1974 book The Outlying Fells of Lakeland.[10]
More recently Cartmel has emerged as a foodie destination. Cartmel sticky toffee pudding was first sold at the village shop in 1984[11] and grew in popularity: it is now sold in supermarkets around the UK. The Cartmel Sticky Toffee Company, who make it, moved to a larger factory in nearby Flookburgh in the 2000s but still operate[clarification needed] and sell from the village shop in Cartmel.[12] In 2002, chef Simon Rogan opened L'Enclume restaurant in the village. The restaurant quickly became one of the UK's most popular, and held top spot as the UK's best restaurant in The Good Food Guide from 2014–2017, returning to the top in 2020.[13] In 2022 it became the first restaurant in the UK outside London and the South-East to gain 3 Michelin stars.[14] Rogan makes use of the agricultural hinterland of Cartmel and most of the produce supplied to the restaurant is grown on the peninsula, including Rogan's nearby 12-acre (4.9 ha) farm.[15] Rogan's second restaurant in Cartmel, Rogan & Co, is also Michelin-starred,[16] and the village also hosts Unsworth's Yard, a collection of artisan-food retailers who use local produce.[16]
