For many years considered by discerning visitors to be one of the most supremely beautiful in the area, Dentdale has, up until now, received little publicity, the available information concerning it being mostly of a rather specialist and scholarly nature, either geological or ecological, with very little to satisfy the general visitor wishing to learn something of the day-to-day lives of the ordinary Dalesfolk themselves in times past.

However, this omission will shortly be well and truly rectified by the opening in May 2006 of the new Dent Heritage Centre, in which visitors are invited to “Step Back in Time” and enjoy the full hands-on experience of life in the Dales from earliest times to the present day, all of this being devised and presented by the local Dalesfolk themselves as a living tribute to their long-gone forbears.

The Centre itself has been carefully built out of natural stone by local craftsmen in order to blend in beautifully with the existing vernacular architecture and the surrounding countryside, so as to create a real and lasting work of art for future generations of Dalesfolk to cherish and enjoy, the whole project being made financially possible with support from Defra and the Millennium Trust.