The four nights in St Ives to celebrate our twentieth wedding anniversary also fulfilled a long held ambition to visit Barbara Hepworth’s home and sculpture garden, as well as the exhibition of her work hosted by Tate St Ives, which moves on to Eastbourne in May. And after another demanding spring I needed time by the sea.

We left the house at 09.00, travelling via Exeter with GWR and arrived at 15.30, with every train running to time as well as offering working wifi. David’s book is entering its final phase – and so dozens of emails were dispatched throughout the day to ask each contributing producer to check the contents of the paragraphs about them. Addictive sort of work; best done in small bites!

We arrived in the bright spring sunshine and crystal clear blue skies that made St Ives so attractive to artists and photographers long before wetsuits made surfing enjoyable in cold British waters. Here’s the view from our room, and routine cascades at high tide on the footpath below.

We spent the first evening walking the curious streets of this extraordinary place, finding our bearings and exploring the three glorious beaches that encircle the harbour; climbing the little headland and moving round to the west-facing Tate St Ives and St Ia’s Well, once the sole source of water for the medieval community. (Apparently St Ia sailed from Ireland on a leaf in the fifth century, followed later by another Cornish saint on a millstone…That takes talent!!)

And unlike the lugger Lloyd SS5 it has taken me 60 years to get from Scarborough to St Ives….

The next morning we headed for the Barbara Hepworth Museum and Sculpture Garden to catch the bright morning light on her amazing creations. Trewyn Studio was her home from 1949 until her death there in 1975. Her Will directed the executors to establish a permanent exhibition in the studio and its garden, which was achieved after some wrangling for government funding and its adoption by the Tate Gallery in 1980, who still curate and staff it.

The light caught the shapes framing exquisite glimpses of new spring growth, itself brilliantly curated by a gardener faithful to Hepworth’s original concept and plantings. It was breath-taking….

Back inside the studio itself were her tools – dozens of files, little hammers and chisels; her smocks and aprons, some of her furnishings, all gathering dust of the passing decades but so evocative of her immersion in materials, consummate skill and exceptional imagination. The walls of the downstairs space now chart her complex (giving birth to triplets must have been a shock!) and sometimes tragic life, and carry some illuminating quotations:

As well as her smaller more intimate pieces:

There is no shortage of shopping opportunities in St Ives especially if you like sophisticated versions of seaside kitsch and mediterranean colours. Fore Street is the place to go, and indeed Finisterre furnished David with a new orange waterproof jacket to replace a long-serving blue version. And there is an abundance of places to eat, catering for every palate. The Seafood cafe provided – yes – a very good seafood supper on our first night; Source on our second night was outstanding, very fresh mussels main dish, alongside small plates of delicious and subtle vegetables (beetroot, asparagus, celeriac) adorned with exotic, imaginatively prepared chickpea, pistachio and yoghurts.

For our anniversary itself David had booked 27 The Terrace where Grant Nethercott as Head Chef presides over a seven course tasting menu with accompanying wines. His food was exquisite; the wines (a flight of which we shared) perhaps less impressive but the whole experience was delightful. The very traditional interior decor of no. 27 gave no clues about Grant’s artistic credentials…

Grant used to be Head Chef at Alba, a unique restaurant adjacent to the Lifeboat house on the front. His brother Craig collects Cornish art, much of which was displayed there, until the whole business was sold in 2017. There were works by Frost, Hepworth, Nicholson, Wallis and more, as the cover of the Alba Art Book boasts. Sadly that restaurant (but not the art!) burnt down during covid…. Notice the works on show on the wall of the pre-fire restaurant by Terry Frost (left), Patrick Heron (right) as well as that of Roger Hilton below right. It must have been a fantastic destination!

The view at breakfast on a duller day. Despite the cloud, the sea is benign; the wind has moved around. The imperious gulls are everywhere, shamelessly preying on unsuspecting ice cream and chip eaters. Touch of the Hitchcocks…. Thank goodness for glass!

We had already walked west for a short distance along the coast path on a previous evening; this time we walked south and east out of St Ives towards Carbis Bay through pleasant enough early twentieth century expansion of the town, along routes which kept parallel to the sea until we finally crossed the deep railway cutting on an old footbridge, and brought us down behind a large holiday destination – newish build for surfers on the seaward side of an Edwardian hotel. (Lots of little privatised suites and apartments where people hope to ignore each other successfully)

We walked on, past the Carbis Bay railway station towards Hawkes Point, but keeping to the road in the vain hope of finding a pub. We did pass Barbara Hepworth’s first home (to which she moved her young family in 1939) now surrounded by vast, very expensive and possibly exclusive newish holiday apartments, secluded by shutters and blinds. Not a pub, a shop, a church, or a person to be seen. We gave up on the beer, and settled for an ice cream in the only cafe we’d seen, in the holiday destination build.

We enjoyed our final supper in a restaurant literally on the beach beneath Tate St Ives, watching the sun set and the fabulous waves. The food has been consistently good – imaginative and varied. Discovering a little wine bar run by wine enthusiasts added to our enjoyment, as did Tate St Ives, not only for its Hepworth exhibition, but also its distinctive and eye-catching architecture. (There’s another blog in the making ! Watch this space…)

Out of the main season, St Ives is a delightful destination. We had a very happy and memorable time.