II*Church · listed 1979Church of St SwithunPhoto: St Swithun's VC Lower School · CC BY-SA 2.0
Photo: PAUL FARMER · CC BY-SA 2.0C+History Grade
History of Sandy · Historic England
27 listed buildings, 1 of them Grade II*
Historic England counts them inside Sandy’s built-up area, 24 for every 10,000 residents. 26 of Sandy’s listed buildings are Grade II. 13% of its homes were built before 1919. Sandy grades C+ for history: #12 of 33 in Bedfordshire.
Listed buildings
27
24 per 10,000 residents
Grade I
0
exceptional interest
Grade II*
1
more than special interest
Scheduled monuments
0
nationally important sites
Homes built before 1919
13%
typical UK town 15%
In pictures
Sandy in 6 photos and old views
Nearly every Grade I and II* building, photographed, and the town before 1950. Tap a photo to step through them full screen.
Photos from Wikimedia Commons and Geograph, copied to our own server, each credited to its photographer with its licence; names open the building’s page or its official list entry.
Through time
Sandy from 1908 to 1915
4 old photos and postcards, in date order. All public domain, made before 1950.
1908
1915
Public domain, from Wikimedia Commons, copied to our own server. Each credit opens the image’s page with its full description and history.
The map
Where Sandy’s history is
Every Grade I and II* building, monument and historic park, over the age of each neighbourhood’s homes.
Grade II*
Homes built before 1919, by neighbourhoodunder 10%10–25%25–50%50%+
0 of 7neighbourhoods have mostly pre-1919 homes; in the oldest, 29% were built before 1919.
Hover a dot for its name; tap one with a photo to open it.
27 listed buildings by grade
0 Grade I1 Grade II*26 Grade II
Historic England lists buildings in three grades: Grade I for buildings of exceptional interest (about 2.5% of all listed buildings), Grade II* for particularly important buildings of more than special interest (about 5.8%), and Grade II for buildings of special interest (about 91.7%). Listing protects the whole building, inside and out.
Every entry on the National Heritage List for England whose point lies inside the ONS 2022 built-up-area boundary. One list entry can cover a terrace or a group of buildings. Neighbourhood dots: the population-weighted centre of each Census 2021 output area, coloured by its neighbourhood’s (LSOA’s) share of homes built before 1919 (Valuation Office Agency, March 2025).
Grade II*
The Grade II* listed building in Sandy
Particularly important buildings of more than special interest. Every one is photographed. Each opens its own page, with the official list entry.
What’s protected
Most of Sandy’s listed buildings are homes
Every listed building sorted by what its list name says it is.
Houses, terraces & villas22
Inns, shops & warehouses2
Churches, chapels & priories1
Public & civic buildings1
Memorials, crosses & tombs1
22 entries (81%) are houses, terraces and villas. 1 are churches, chapels and priories.
Buildings are sorted by words in each entry’s name (church, gate, inn, memorial…): the list’s open data has no building type. An entry named only by its address counts as a house.
Grade II
26 Grade II listed buildings
Most listed buildings are in this grade, which covers buildings of special interest. Open any building to read its official list entry.
All 26 Grade II listed buildings, A to Z
Barns Adjoining to No. 30Kings Arms Public HouseNo 44 and the Post OfficePark HouseQueens Head Public HouseSandy War MemorialSandye PlaceWest Farmhouse1, Swaden10 and 11, Pleasant Place10, London Road103, High Street2, Stratford Road3 and 5, London Road30, Brickhill Road32, London Road37, Ivel Road51 and 51A, High Street52, London Road53-57, Bedford Road59 and 59A, High Street61, High Street70 and 72, High Street76, London Road96, London Road97, High Street
Conservation areas
1 conservation area covers 7.3% of Sandy
Areas the council protects as a whole: demolition and changes to how buildings look need consent, and trees are protected.
Sandy 197821 ha
21 hain conservation areas, of 289 ha inside the built-up area.
9 of the 27 listed buildings stand in one.
Historic England’s conservation areas layer, supplied by councils (incomplete in places, so a page fact, never graded). Hectares are the part of each area inside the built-up area.
How the list grew
More than half of Sandy’s listed buildings were added in one year, 1979
The year each building now on the list was first listed.
1979 · 22
19501960197019801990200020102020
The first 1 entry was listed in 1949. 22 came in 1979, in the national resurvey of the 1970s and 80s. Only 1 has been added in the last 15 years.
History Grade
Sandy grades C+ for history
Protected heritage and the age of the town’s homes, against all UK towns.
Protected heritage, for its size and in all (28 points, 25 per 10,000 residents)More than 49% of UK towns
Homes built before 1919 (13%)More than 36% of UK towns
Two measures, each ranked against every UK town of 1,000 or more, with protected heritage counting twice as much as the age of homes. Protected heritage counts each listed building by its grade (Grade I three points, II* two, II one), each scheduled monument and battlefield two, and each registered park or garden by its grade; it is ranked both per 10,000 residents and as a total, so a village with one fine church doesn’t outrank a historic city. The second measure is the share of homes built before 1919, from the Valuation Office Agency’s council tax records. History is a character grade: it describes the town and isn’t part of the overall grade.
Neighbours
Listed buildings in the places around Sandy
| Town | People | Listed | Grade I | History |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sandy | 11,375 | 27 | 0 | C+ |
| Blunham | 1,391 | 17 | 1 | B+ |
| Upper Caldecote | 1,333 | 6 | 0 | C |
| Great Barford | 2,254 | 27 | 0 | B |
| Potton | 5,229 | 41 | 1 | B |
| Biggleswade | 21,945 | 49 | 0 | C+ |
| Gamlingay | 2,920 | 61 | 1 | A− |
| Langford | 3,712 | 5 | 1 | C− |
In brief
Sandy in brief
Sandy has 27 listed buildings, including Church of St Swithun. A conservation area has protected part of it since 1978. Most entries on the list, 81%, are houses, terraces and villas. The big year was 1979, when 22 of the 27 went on the list. Otherwise the figures are ordinary: like most towns its size, it has no Grade I building; per resident it sits near the middle of UK towns; and Alfred Richardson (1874) was born here before 1900.
Questions about Sandy’s history
How many listed buildings are there in Sandy?
Historic England lists 27 buildings inside Sandy’s built-up area: 0 Grade I, 1 Grade II* and 26 Grade II.
How many conservation areas are there in Sandy?
1, covering about 21 hectares of the town. The largest is Sandy.
When were Sandy’s buildings listed?
The first in 1949; the most, 22, in 1979.
Are there old photos of Sandy?
Yes: 4 public-domain photos and postcards from 1908 to 1915, all on this page.
How old are the homes in Sandy?
13% of homes were built before 1919 and 18% before 1940, from the Valuation Office Agency’s council tax records (March 2025).
© Historic England 2026. Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2026. The National Heritage List for England is the official, up-to-date register of all nationally protected historic buildings and sites in England; check an entry on Historic England’s website before relying on it.
Sources: Historic England, National Heritage List for England (listed buildings, scheduled monuments, registered parks and gardens, battlefields, World Heritage Sites), October 2026, inside the ONS 2022 built-up-area boundary · Valuation Office Agency, Council Tax: stock of properties by build period (31 March 2025) · TownRatings grades: our own summary of the data, ranked against UK towns only · Historic England conservation areas (supplied by local planning authorities; October 2026). All under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Contains HM Land Registry data © Crown copyright and database right 2026. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026 (ONS boundaries). Northern Ireland: Source: NISRA; contains Land & Property Services data and Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland information, © Crown copyright, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Scotland: contains National Records of Scotland data, Registers of Scotland data and SEPA data, © Crown copyright / © SEPA 2025, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.