47 listed buildings, 1 of them Grade I

Ightham PlaceGrade II* listedOld Forge HouseGrade II* listed

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.

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 8 entries were listed in 1952. 34 came in 1984, 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.

29% of homes are Victorian or older, against 16% across England and Wales. The busiest period since was 1993–99, which added 18% 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 (10 here) are left out; 1939–44 is not a period in the data.

Old houses are part of Ightham’s character: 35% of its homes were built before 1919, against 15% in the typical UK town. All told, the list holds 47 listed buildings, 1 of them Grade I. Per resident, it has more listed heritage than 82% of UK towns. Only 88 of the 1,477 towns nearest its size have more Grade I buildings.

Its older streets lie in 3 conservation areas, the first designated in 1971. Most entries on the list, 60%, are houses, terraces and villas. The big year was 1984, when 34 of the 47 went on the list.