11 listed buildings, 1 of them Grade II*

Church of St LawrenceGrade II* listedButchers HouseGrade II listedRegistry OfficeGrade II listed8 Market PlaceGrade II listedChurch of St AndrewGrade II listed+1See all photos

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.

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).

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.

The first 1 entry was listed in 1963. 10 came in 1988, in the national resurvey of the 1970s and 80s. Only 0 have been added in the last 15 years.

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.

20% of homes are Victorian or older, against 16% across England and Wales. The busiest period since was 1945–54, which added 12% of today’s homes.

Valuation Office Agency, council tax stock of properties by build period, 31 March 2025, for the neighbourhoods (LSOAs) that make up the town, split by where their residents live. Homes with no recorded build period (81 here) are left out; 1939–44 is not a period in the data.

Henry Garnet

William Howitt

Richard Howitt

Godfrey Howitt

William Cubley

Edward Smith

Francis Dixon

Henry Slater

John Ackroyd

Billy Bestwick

George Woolley

Herbert Slater

Thomas Fletcher

Tommy Fletcher

Algernon Pynegar

William Gregg

Ernie Brooks

Archibald Ackroyd

155016001650170017501800185019001950

Henry Garnet1555–1606 · English Jesuit, executed because of his involvement in the Gunpowder …

William Howitt1792–1879 · British writer (1792–1879)

JA

John Ackroyd1868–1927 · Footballer (1868-1927)

Edward Smith1819–1874 · British physician and botanist (1819–1874)

Billy Bestwick1875–1938 · English cricketer (1875-1938)

AA

Archibald Ackroyd1897–1968 · Cricketer (1897-1968)

FD

Francis Dixon1854–1943 · English cricketer (1854-1943)

HS

Henry Slater1855–1916 · English cricketer (1855-1916)

Everyone born in Heanor → Birthplaces from Wikidata; portraits from Wikimedia Commons.

Old houses are part of Heanor’s character: 29% of its homes were built before 1919, against 15% in the typical UK town. In all there are 11 listed buildings, including Church of St Lawrence. A conservation area has protected part of it since 1996. Of the 18 people born here before 1900, the best known include Henry Garnet (1555), William Howitt (1792) and John Ackroyd (1868).

The big year was 1988, when 10 of the 11 went on the list. For its size the list is short: per resident, it has more listed heritage than only 24% of UK towns. The rest is about typical: like most towns its size, it has no Grade I building.