St Ives & Halsetown

St Ives sits on a granite headland with a working harbour at its core, narrow streets that step down to beaches, and galleries that grew from a local artists’ community. Tate St Ives looks over Porthmeor Beach and displays work tied to the town’s coastal light; the Barbara Hepworth Museum and Sculpture Garden occupies the artist’s former studio near the harbour. Fishing boats still share the quay with leisure craft, and the single-track branch line from St Erth ends at the town station close to the seafront, bringing day visitors and local commuters alike.

A short distance inland, Halsetown began as a 19th-century planned village built for mine workers, with rows of cottages and lanes that open on to fields and hedgerows. From parts of the village you can look back down the valley to St Ives Bay, and the South West Coast Path runs along the nearby cliffs, linking beaches, coves and old mining remains. Local life mixes tourism and fishing with community events and weekday routines that follow the tides and the train timetable.