Snobbiest places in the UK?

[phranes]

Following from similar threads about overrated and underrated places in the UK... where are the snobbiest places in the UK?

From the places I've been, I'd say Harrogate, Oxford, and the rest of the Cotswolds.

@PictureNest

Forgot to add two actually

Basildon and Luton

Luton ?? I used to work there it's a complete dump.

Not Luton but Watford is obviously super snobby and posh, can't move for retired brigadiers and Amandas from Motherland.

Agree with Pontcanna and it's a classic example of a place that people claim to live in, when really they live in Canton.

Farnham, mainly the people on the Hants border who say they live in Farnham but are in fact Aldershot the horror

Rhiwbina (village) in Cardiff is a place where snobiness has increased exponentially in the past 20 years.

I know many of the places others have described as snobby, and don't find them so at all.

I see Sutton Coldfield has been mentioned. I have never been but the only person I have ever known that had elocution lessons was brought up there. She used to pronounce the 'h' in Birmingham which I thought very odd.

@SunflowersAndLavender

Snobs are usually new money not old. So I would agree with Surrey and Crouch End.

ArghmyHip didn't say there was no old money at all in Surrey. She just implied there was lots of new money there. Which there is.

And I agree, I do find people from Surrey can be very smug about it, even if they live somewhere decidedly unimpressive themselves, it's still Surrey, so they feel entitled to bask in the cache and look down on people from counties they perceive to be lesser.

ALL of the home counties have pockets of nouveau riche areas. Essex and Bucks have an equally bad much worse reputation for being places that attract new money, but as usual on MN, Surrey gets it in the neck!

Your post just comes across as bitter and jealous. Surrey is a county, and as such, there are good and bad parts. I am lucky enough to live in a gorgeous good part, I'm not smug about it (okay, I just was a little smug) but I will defend it when it persistently gets a bad rep on MN.

Oh and of the Home Counties, along with Berkshire, Surrey is definitely more inclined toward old establishment types than any of the other wealthier Home Counties. I know this because have lived in some of the 'old money' areas, so know it better than you.

If you think Worcester is bad try Pershore.

@Cinclus

Agree with Pontcanna and it's a classic example of a place that people claim to live in, when really they live in Canton.

I lived in Pontcanna as a child in the 60's/70's. My address was definitely Canton. Pontcanna started to be used as an area sometime in the late 70's or early 80's

Oh and of the Home Counties, along with Berkshire, Surrey is definitely more inclined toward old establishment types than any of the other wealthier Home Counties. I know this because have lived in some of the 'old money' areas, so know it better than you.

This is a great example of snobby! How dare you accuse me of being 'nouveau', shudder! 😆

And I agree, I do find people from Surrey can be very smug about it, even if they live somewhere decidedly unimpressive themselves, it's still Surrey, so they feel entitled to bask in the cache and look down on people from counties they perceive to be lesser.

Lol. Chippy much?

@friedafried

If you think Worcester is bad try Pershore.

If you think Pershore is bad, try Wick!

Oh and of the Home Counties, along with Berkshire, Surrey is definitely more inclined toward old establishment types than any of the other wealthier Home Counties. I know this because have lived in some of the 'old money' areas, so know it better than you.

But how do you know you know the social topography of the Home Counties better than the other poster, or where she may have lived, @HowToBringABlushToTheSnow?

There was certainly a perception in socially-attuned novels of manners of the first third of the 20thc that Surrey was a byword for 'trade' and insignificance. Elizabeth Bowen's The Last September from 1929 has an Anglo-Irish aristocrat dismiss a British army officer as a candidate for her niece's hand on the grounds that his mother lives in Surrey, that 'part of it is practically opposite the Thames Embankment' and that his relations are 'just villa-ry' and 'no one who's ever been heard of'.

Isn’t one of the objections about the Kroesig family in Nancy Mitford’s “The pursuit of love” is that their country house is in Surrey!

Watford used to have its snobby area, the Cassiobury Estate, near Cassiobury Park. Maybe even that has changed.

I know this because have lived in some of the 'old money' areas, so know it better than you.

Mmm, not sure you’re helping the cause for Surrey there..

Pershore?

Edinburgh. Used to work there (but lived in Glasgow, yay for Glasgow) and honestly found everyone in shops, hairdressers, cafes etc to be utterly up themselves.
Also a couple of younger native Edinburghers I worked with were too cool for school and superior. Older people fab though.

Also the incomers to the more gentrified parts of East London can be quite bad- Hackney, Stoke Newington.
I must protest! I live in this area (for over a decade, although probably still count as an incomer) and I'm lovely as are the vast majority of the people I know here.
I generally find London really friendly and unpretentious, but I guess I don't make a habit of hanging out in Chelsea.

I agree with everyone who said Salcombe. Guildford is the WORST.

Bath.
I live here, I left and had to return for family.
Its definitely a city of have and have nots with Mrs Entitled in her 4x4 who cant drive.

Leamington Spa

Maidenhead and Windsor are great places to live. Old money mixed with ‘yummy mummy brigade’
Best of both worlds.

High priced housing excludes the nerdowells. Being near London helps the cultural and theatrical types. Def a good mix of people.
PS. Slough should have a warning - never venture there.

Definitely agree with Harrogate, we have never dressed particularly smartly but had gone out for the day about 15 years ago, to wander the shops & have a nice meal. My husband is a big collector of ship’s lamps; I’d just been made redundant & had a VERY healthy bank account.
We saw an antiques shop with a lamp that would have fitted in with his collection perfectly. We went in & the owner immediately came to us & said “I don’t think there’s anything in here for your sort”, sniffed & turned his back on us.
We weren’t scruffy, both in jeans & trainers but both perfectly clean; he lost himself an £800 sale there and then.
Never judge on appearances, Harrogate.

Winchester. It is fashionable there to have your own clique, which will even have it's own named entry ritual. If you are not in the right clique you will be blanked outside essential interaction. Yes, I am talking about school mums and other adults here.....

The Trafford/Wirral thing isn't a snobfest, it's just a throwback to historical boundaries. South of the River Mersey was the definition of Cheshire- so included Sale, Alty, Birkenhead and the likes. So the northern part of Trafford would have been Lancashire - hence the cricket club. Because the post office doesn't recognise counties - just post towns - addresses largely stayed the same when the new boundaries were created. It's a similar situation in the South now that Middlesex doesn't exist and has been replaced by London Boroughs.