Calder Bridge

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Calder Bridge is a small village in Cumbria, England, located on the River Calder between the hamlets of Gosforth and Beckermet. It sits about a mile northeast of the Sellafield site, where Calder Hall Nuclear Power Station opened in 1956 as the world’s first major nuclear power plant.

The village has several notable buildings. St Bridget’s Church is a Grade II listed church built in 1842 from red sandstone ashlar with a slate roof. It contains Pre-Raphaelite stained glass from 1879 designed by H. E. Wooldridge and H. J. Burrow, and it was listed in 1989. Pelham House, on the south side of Calder Bridge and formerly known as Ponsonby Hall, is also Grade II listed. Built in 1774 to designs by James Paine for Edward Stanley, it is now offices for the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority after previously serving as a School for Boys.

Calder Abbey lies by the River Calder just northeast of the village. Founded in 1134 for Cistercians who moved from Furness Abbey, it is now a picturesque ruin next to Calder Abbey House, a largely 19th-century home that still shows some abbey remains. The area includes woodland historically known as Ponsonby woods. The Stanley Arms inn has 13 rooms, and the village was once home to the Golden Fleece inn.