The Yorkshire moors have been the stars of the big screen this February with the release of Emerald Fennell’s interpretation of one of the world’s greatest love stories, Wuthering Heights, starring Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi. While much of the new movie’s filming took place around the Yorkshire Dales National Park in North Yorkshire, the moors that inspired Emily Brontë’s original novel are located around the village of Haworth in the west of the county.
I too grew up on the edge of the flat-topped, windy Pennines. Brontë portrayed these landscapes as being bleak, unforgiving, and tempestuous—and at many times of year they are, but they are also staggeringly beautiful and have given birth to some of the United Kingdom’s greatest 20th-century artists and sculptors.
People from this part of Yorkshire have a reputation for being a little Heathcliff-like in our moroseness. We’re sometimes tight-lipped and temperamental, often straightforward to the point of seeming rude. Perhaps our personalities are shaped by the terrain and the harsh elements that formed it. But also like Heathcliff, beneath the rugged surface there’s a sense of romance. Hearts here can be warm enough to cut through cold winter nights. We can be dark and brooding one day and light and joyous the next, like sunshine breaking through the clouds over the fell, or heather erupting into a carpet of purple on the moors on a late summer’s day. Visit our towns and villages and you’ll encounter a straightforward kindness underlying the bluntness, as well as a sharp sense of humor.
As a teenager I couldn’t wait to get away, to travel far from these treeless hills, away from the long dark nights and the niggling feeling that the place was too small for a heart hungry for adventure. But now when I return to West Yorkshire, I finally—and gratefully—see it for what it is. This isn’t a place that preens in unnecessary prettiness but instead wears its beauty casually and comfortably, like an old pair of worn-in boots. These landscapes may feel untamed, temperamental, and raw, but that’s where their romance lies. Here are some of the best places to visit in West Yorkshire that have inspired countless artists, sculptors, writers, and grown-up restless teenagers.
A version of this article originally appeared in Condé Nast Traveller Middle East.
Haworth Village and Brontë Country
As with the Brontë sisters’ stories, we must begin in the cobblestone village of Haworth, 16 kilometers outside the city of Bradford. This is the heart of Brontë Country, a collection of sites associated with the sisters’ novels that draw literature lovers from around the world. First stop is the family’s former home, now the Brontë Parsonage Museum, where visitors peer at pages from Emily’s diary, Charlotte’s writing desk, and Anne’s collection of pebbles from the beach in Scarborough. It makes you wonder what withering comments they might have to make about it all. To blow the cobwebs off, stride out to Top Withens, the ruined farmhouse believed to have been the inspiration for Wuthering Heights, and the newly designated National Nature Reserve of Penistone Hill Country Park, just above the museum. Rather unexpectedly, Haworth is twinned with Machu Picchu in Peru. There may not be an Incan citadel here and sheep far outnumber alpacas, but both places share a textile heritage, steam railways, tourism-dependent economies, and landscapes so beautiful they’re worthy of global recognition.