151 listed buildings, 1 of them Grade I

Parish Church of St MildredGrade I listedMaynard's FarmhouseGrade II* listedThe Lemon TreeGrade II* listedThe White Lion HotelGrade II listedTenterden & District MuseumGrade II listed+5See 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.

c. 1908

Public domain, from Wikimedia Commons, copied to our own server. Each credit opens the image’s page with its full description and history.

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).

High Street55 listed

Ashford Road10 listed

West Cross6 listed

East Cross5 listed · 1 II*

Bell's Lane4 listed

Golden Square3 listed

Of the 151 entries, 89 are named by a street address; the rest are named buildings such as churches, halls and bridges.

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 50 entries were listed in 1950, 1 of the 1 Grade I buildings among them. 60 came in 1972, in the national resurvey of the 1970s and 80s. Only 2 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.

Ralph Whitfield

Nathaniel Ely

Thomas Hinckley

George Rolfe

James H. Osmer

Henry Lansdell

James Body

Harry Finn

155016001650170017501800185019001950

Henry Lansdell1841–1919 · Clergyman, explorer and author (1841-1919)

James H. Osmer1832–1912 · American politician (1832–1912)

NE

Nathaniel Ely1605–1675 · Founding settler of Hartford and Norwalk, Connecticut

TH

Thomas Hinckley1618–1706 · Governor of the Plymouth Colony

Harry Finn1852–1924 · British Army general (1852-1924)

RW

Ralph Whitfield1588–1645 · English lawyer, judge and landowner

GR

George Rolfe1808–1871 · Merchant and politician in Victoria, Australia (1808–1871)

JB

James Body1846–1929 · English rugby union player (1846–1929)

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

Per resident, Tenterden has more listed heritage than 90% of UK towns. All told, the list holds 151 listed buildings, 1 of them Grade I, including Parish Church of St Mildred. Only 91 of the 766 towns nearest its size have more Grade I buildings. On High Street alone there are 55 listed buildings.

A conservation area protects part of it. Most entries on the list, 85%, are houses, terraces and villas. Henry Lansdell (1841), James H. Osmer (1832) and Nathaniel Ely (1605) are among the 8 people born here before 1900. Beyond that, 19% of its homes were built before 1919, close to the 15% in the typical UK town.