A best kept village is a

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

that has won one of the annual county

competition Competition is a rivalry where two or more parties strive for a common goal which cannot be shared: where one's gain is the other's loss (an example of which is a zero-sum game). Competition can arise between entities such as organisms, indi ...

s in the United Kingdom for its tidiness, appropriateness, and typicality. The competitions have been nationally organized by the

Campaign to Protect Rural England Campaign or The Campaign may refer to: Types of campaigns * Campaign, in agriculture, the period during which sugar beet A sugar beet is a plant whose root contains a high concentration of sucrose and that is grown commercially for sugar produ ...

(CPRE) since the early 1970s.

Criteria

Competing villages fall into one of four groups: A panel of anonymous judges, touring between May and June and conducting final judging in July and August, evaluates each village on the following criteria: * Absence of

litter Litter consists of waste products that have been discarded incorrectly, without consent, at an unsuitable location. The waste is objects, often man-made, such as aluminum cans, paper cups, food wrappers, cardboard boxes or plastic bottles, but ...

and unsightly refuse dumps on verges (10 points) * Condition of village greens, playing fields, school yards, public seats, and noticeboards (10 points) * Condition of public and private buildings, gardens, and allotments (10 points) * Condition of churchyards, cemeteries, and war memorials (10 points) * Condition of public halls, sports facilities, and car parks (10 points) * Cleanliness of public toilets, bus shelters, and telephone kiosks (10 points) * State of footpaths, stiles, field gates, signposting, ponds, and streams (10 points) * Condition of commercial and business premises, including advertisements and other signs (10 points) * Initiative in the care of the environment of the village (10 points) * Evidence of community spirit and usefulness of Village Map (10 points) The CPRE makes it clear that the competition is not about finding "the most beautiful village, nor the most ancient, nor the most picturesque, just the one that is best cared for" and "its aim is to involve everyone in the village, encouraging them to take greater pride in their surroundings." Villages are judged on how clean and well cared for they are, as well as their impact on the environment.

Awards and benefits

Winners of group A (those which have already won in the previous five years) receive the Pertwee Bowl for Past Winners, while winners in the other groups receive a CPRE shield. Group winners also receive a "Best Kept Village" road sign and certificates. Noted benefits include decreased littering, greater community communication, communal pride in homes and public spaces, a more attractive and welcoming appearance, name recognition for the village, and increased tourism and income for local businesses.

Criticism

Criticisms of the competition include "townies" moving into villages and changing the local culture and villagers who do not fit in with the

ethos ''Ethos'' is a Greek word meaning 'character' that is used to describe the guiding beliefs or ideals that characterize a community, nation, or ideology; and the balance between caution and passion. The Greeks also used this word to refer to the ...

of a "best kept village" may be excluded.

In fiction

Ambridge Ambridge may refer to: * Ambridge (''The Archers''), a fictional place in the UK radio programme, ''The Archers'' * Ambridge, Indiana, a former neighborhood, now part of Ambridge Mann, Indiana, US ** Ambridge station, a former railway station in A ...

Borsetshire Borsetshire is a fictional county in the BBC Radio 4 series ''The Archers''. Its county town is the equally fictional Borchester. The county is supposedly set between Worcestershire and Warwickshire, but is also intended as a generic West Midl ...

has been a winner in the radio

soap opera A soap opera (also called a daytime drama or soap) is a genre of a long-running radio or television Serial (radio and television), serial, frequently characterized by melodrama, ensemble casts, and sentimentality. The term ''soap opera'' originat ...

The Archers ''The Archers'' is a British radio soap opera currently broadcast on BBC Radio 4, the corporation's main spoken-word Radio broadcasting, channel. Broadcast since 1951, it was famously billed as "an everyday story of country folk" and is now pr ...

''. * At the start of the "Dibley Live" (1998) episode of the TV comedy ''

The Vicar of Dibley ''The Vicar of Dibley'' is a British sitcom. It consists of three series, which aired on BBC One from 10 November 1994 to 1 January 2000, and several specials, the most recent of which aired on 23 December 2020. It is set in the fictional Oxfor ...

'', the council members forgo entering the competition, having come in 54th out of 54 the previous year; Denfield, where a lorry-load of BSE-infected toxic waste had crashed into a nuclear fuel tanker causing a crater 200ft wide and the evacuation of the entire village, was 53rd. * The ''

Postman Pat ''Postman Pat'' is a British stop motion animated television series, animated children's television series first produced by Woodland Animations. The series follows the adventures of Pat Clifton, a Mail carrier, postman who works for the Royal ...

'' episode ''Postman Pat had the Best Village'' focus on the villagers of Greendale making their village nice and clean and decked with beautiful flowers so they could try and win the Best Village Competition. Greendale win the competition thanks to a new hillock; which was Ted Glen's lorry covered with flowerpots and shrubs with some pretended grass covering the lorry and a fence around it. * Much of the plot to the 2007 British film ''

Hot Fuzz ''Hot Fuzz'' is a 2007 buddy cop action comedy film directed by Edgar Wright, who co-wrote the film with Simon Pegg. Pegg stars as Nicholas Angel, an elite London police officer, whose proficiency makes the rest of his team look bad, causing hi ...

'' revolves around the lengths the citizens of Sanford will go to in their attempt at keeping a best kept village award.

References

External links

*{{Official website, https://web.archive.org/web/20080303202759/http://www.cpre.org.uk:80/home, CPRE British awards Competitions in the United Kingdom Villages in the United Kingdom