Box, Wiltshire

Box is a pretty Cotswold village with a main road through its middle and a Cold War bunker for the Prime Minister under the hill next door, which tells you how much the twentieth century cared about its peace and quiet. Brunel drove his famous tunnel straight through Box Hill, then the railway shut both stations, so the trains still come through at full speed and decline to stop. Thomas Bowdler, the man who scrubbed the rude bits out of Shakespeare, was born here, and the village has kept the family business going: the honey-coloured stone gets all the attention, and the lorries on the A4 get quietly left out.