Blandford Forum ( ) is a market town in Dorset, England, on the River Stour, north-west of Poole. It had a population of 10,607 at the 2021 census.
The town is notable for its Georgian architecture, the result of rebuilding after a major fire in 1731; it was assisted by an Act of Parliament and a donation by George II, to designs by local architects John and William Bastard.
The town's economy is based on a mix of the service sector and light industry. Blandford Camp, a military base, is on the hills north-east of the town. It is the base of the Royal Corps of Signals, the communications wing of the British Army, and the site of the Royal Signals Museum.
History Blandford has been a fording point on the River Stour since Anglo-Saxon times. The name Blandford derives from the Old English blǣge, and probably means ford where gudgeon or blay are found.OED, s.v. "blay". The name Blaneford or Bleneford is recorded in the Domesday Book, referring not to Blandford Forum itself but to the adjacent villages of Bryanston and Blandford St Mary on the opposite side of the ford, and Langton Long Blandford further downstream.
By the 13th century, the settlement on the north bank of the river had become a market town with a livestock market serving the nearby Blackmore Vale with its many dairy farms. At the start of the 14th century, it returned two members of parliament and was also known as Cheping Blandford, where Cheping or Chipping refers to a market. The Latin translation Forum was first recorded in 1540.Mills, A. D., 1986. Dorset Place Names. Ensign, Southampton.
In Survey of Dorsetshire, written by Thomas Gerard of Trent in the early 1630s, Blandford was described as "a faire Markett Towne, pleasantlie seated upon the River ... well inhabitted and of good Traffique".Bettey, pp.68, 128–9 In the 17th-century English Civil War Blandford was a Royalist centre; most inhabitants supported the king.Bettey, p.111
In the 18th century Blandford was one of several lace-making centres in the county; Daniel Defoe stated that lace made in the town was "the finest bonelace in England... I think I never saw better in Flanders, France or Italy".Bettey, p.76 In the 17th and 18th centuries Blandford was also a malting and brewing centre of some significance.Bettey, p.81
Almost all of Blandford's buildings were destroyed on 4 June 1731 by the "great fire", which was the last of several serious fires that occurred in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries. The fire began in a tallow chandler's workshop on a site that is now The King's Arms public house. Within a few hours, almost 90% of the town's fabric had gone; all fire-fighting equipment had been lost to the fire and the church's lead roof had melted. Even properties west of the river in Blandford St Mary and Bryanston were burned, though notable buildings that survived in the town include the Ryves Almshouses and Dale House in Salisbury Street, Old House in The Close, and much of East Street, including Stour House. An Act of Parliament was introduced that stated that rebuilding work must be in brick and tile and should begin within four years. With assistance from the rest of the country—including £1,000 given by King George II—the town was rebuilt over the next ten years to the designs of local architects John and William Bastard. Bottlenecks were removed and streets realigned in the new town plan, which also provided a wider market place. As well as residential and commercial property, new buildings included a new town hall, school and church. The redesigned town centre has survived to the present day virtually intact.
After the post-fire reconstruction Blandford remained a thriving market town. Wool spinning and button making were also significant, and the brewing and hostelry trades expanded. The turnpike road between Salisbury and Dorchester was made in 1756 and passed through the town,Bettey, p85 and the arrival of the coaching era increased the town's prosperity, though the built fabric of the town changed little until the first half of the 19th century, when houses for wealthier inhabitants were built to the north alongside the roads to Salisbury and Shaftesbury. By the time of the 1841 census the town had 3,339 inhabitants. Later in the 19th century, perhaps following the installation of piped water, more densely packed buildings were built to the northeast, replacing gardens and barracks for the poor (that had been erected following the fire) between the roads to Salisbury and Wimborne Minster. Rail transport arrived in Blandford in the 1860s, though this did not impact greatly on the town's economy.
Blandford's weekly animal market disappeared in the 20th century, perhaps a casualty of motorised transport that enabled larger markets to be held in fewer centres (the market at nearby Sturminster Newton increased significantly). By the middle of the 20th century, Blandford Fair, a seasonal sheep fair held in summer and autumn, had also disappeared, due to changes in animal husbandry and a reduction in sheep numbers in the county.
Governance
The civil parish has a parish council, styled Blandford Forum Town Council, of 16 members. This has responsibilities that include outdoor fitness and play areas, CCTV, the cemetery and allotments, venue hire, the indoor market, grass cutting and grit bins.
For local government, Blandford Forum is in Dorset unitary district. For elections to Dorset Council, the Blandford ward has the same boundaries as the parish. Historically, the town was a municipal borough from 1835 until 1974, and from 1894 its hinterland was a rural district named after the town. In 1974, the borough and district were absorbed into the new North Dorset district, which was in turn abolished when Dorset became a unitary district in 2019.
In the House of Commons, Blandford is in the North Dorset constituency whose current member of Parliament (MP) is Simon Hoare of the Conservative party.
Geography
Blandford is situated between Cranborne Chase and the Dorset Downs, to the south-east of the Blackmore Vale, northwest of Poole and south-west of Salisbury. It is sited in the valley of the River Stour, mostly on rising ground northeast of the river, but with some development south of the river at Blandford St Mary.Ordnance Survey (2013), 1:25,000 Explorer Map, Sheet 118 (Shaftesbury & Cranborne Chase), The underlying geology is Cretaceous chalk bedrock that in places is overlain by Quaternary drift: alluvium in the river's flood plain, head deposits around the town's south-west, south and south-east borders, and clay with flints at the highest part of the town in the north.British Geological Survey (1994), 1:50,000 Series. England and Wales Sheet 313 (Shaftesbury) The town is almost surrounded by land that has been designated as having landscape value of national significance: the Dorset National Landscape (an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, or AONB) to the west and the Cranborne Chase and West Wiltshire Downs AONB to the north and east.
Architecture Most of the buildings in Blandford's centre are Georgian, due to the rebuilding after the 1731 fire and the absence of subsequent change. Pevsner stated that "hardly any other town in England can be compared with it". A 1970 report by Donald Insall Associates described Blandford as "the most complete and cohesive surviving example of a Georgian country town in England", with the Market Place area in particular given the status of "An Area of National Importance" and described as "a brilliant master piece" [sic]. Buildings that have received Grade I listing by English Heritage are the parish church of St Peter and St Paul, the town hall and corn exchange, The Old House, Coupar House, Pump House, and several buildings in Market Place: numbers 18, 20 and 26, and the old Greyhound Inn. All the listed structures in Market Place, including the church and another seventeen buildings with either Grade II or Grade II* status, form a group, together with several listed properties in West Street and East Street.
The parish church of St Peter and St Paul was built between 1732 and 1739 and is a classical building with a cupola on top of the tower. The design by John Bastard originally specified that the tower would have a steeple, but lack of money resulted in the wooden cupola instead, a decision that disgusted Bastard, who stated that "it will not keep the wett nor the weather out". Sir Frederick Treves was not a fan of the church's appearance, describing it in his 1906 Highways & Byways in Dorset as "ugly, and only tolerable from a distance". The interior remains relatively unaffected by Victorian interference and retains its font, pulpit, box pews and Mayoral seat.Betjeman, John (ed.) (1968), Collins Pocket Guide to English Parish Churches; the South. London: Collins; p. 172 The pulpit, originally designed for St Antholin's in London, is by Sir Christopher Wren. The organ, dating from 1794, is by George Pike England and is the most intact of his surviving works; it allegedly had been intended for the Savoy Chapel in London, but was too big, so George III supposedly gave it to Blandford instead. In 1893 the church was enlarged by moving the apsidal sanctuary out on rollers onto new foundations and building a new chancel behind it. The Victorians did install galleries to accommodate an increasing congregation, though these were removed in the 1970s, a change that Pevsner called "a visual blessing".
Blandford Forum Town Hall occupies a site in the Market Place close to the site that was occupied by its predecessor. It dates from 1734 and has a two-storey three-windowed frontage of Portland stone ashlar. The ground floor has three semi-circular arches leading to an open portico or loggia, called The Shambles, that used to be part of the market. Toward the back of the building is the old corn exchange, a late 19th-century assembly hall with "interesting elliptical roof-trusses".
Coupar House, dated around 1750, is the largest private house in Blandford that dates from the post-fire period. It has a richly decorated interior with a notable staircase, and is unique among the town's private dwellings for having Portland stone dressings to its brick façade, though the design of this frontage has been described as "curiously amateurish" with "little attention ... paid to rules of proportion".
The Old House was probably built some time between 1650 and 1670 by a German doctor who practised in Blandford after graduating from The Queen's College, Oxford. Its unusual design, which includes a steep hipped roof with wide spreading eaves, has elements of artisan style popular at the time, though it was described by John Hutchins as "an architectural graft from the 'fatherland' planted by the worthy doctor on the soil of his adopted country".
The Pump House fire monument was built by John Bastard in classical style to commemorate the fire. It dates from 1760, is of Portland stone and stands adjacent to the churchyard wall. The inscription on its rear wall states its purpose is "... to prevent by a timely Supply of Water, (with God's Blessing) the fatal Consequences of FIRE hereafter". In 1768 Bastard provided an endowment of £600. The monument was repaired in 1858 and the pump was replaced by a fountain in 1897.
To the south of the town a six-arch stone bridge spans the River Stour; it is built mostly of greensand with some heathstone and was extensively restored in 1726. The water meadows between it and the town are crossed by a causeway and two smaller bridges.
Demographics The 2021 census recorded a parish population of 10,607 in 4,857 households. The Office for National Statistics also define a Blandford Forum built-up-area, which includes the built-up part of Blandford St Mary parish adjacent to the town south of the River Stour, and which had a population of 11,800 in 2021.