Frome

Frome is a town at the eastern end of the Mendip Hills on the River Frome. Frome Town Council and Somerset Council share the running of the place. It is one of the best bases in east Somerset if you like towns with real history, because it has more than 350 listed buildings, more than any other town in Somerset outside Bath.

The town grew through the wool and cloth trade, and in the 1720s Daniel Defoe wrote that Frome was reckoned to have more people in it than the city of Bath. The last fabric mill closed in 1965. In 1685 Frome was the first locality in England to declare for the Duke of Monmouth. The record goes back a long way. A church built by St Aldhelm in 685 is the earliest evidence of Saxon occupation of Frome. Catherine Hill in the town centre has been used as a film location, appearing in the 2016 short film Lucky Chicken. The Cheese and Grain, a former farm produce warehouse, was converted into a market and concert hall in 1997. The Frome Festival fills venues across the town with ten days of music, talks and community arts, provisionally from 2 to 11 July 2027.

Frome railway station opened in 1850. Bath Street is named after the Lord Bath of Longleat House. The town is about 13 miles south of Bath and had 28,567 people at the 2021 census. The Frome Hoard, around 52,500 third-century coins, was found near the town in 2010.

The Mendip Way, an 80 km (50 mi) footpath, links Frome with Weston-super-Mare across the hills. At the western end of that path you reach Weston-super-Mare, and the hills between the two make up the Mendips.