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Hilperton is a village and civil parish in Wiltshire, England. The village is separated by a few fields (the Hilperton Gap) from the northeastern edge of the town of Trowbridge and is approximately from Trowbridge town centre.
To the east of the village are the Devizes Road and Stourton Park housing areas, and Paxcroft, a small industrial hamlet. In the west of the parish is the village of Hilperton Marsh which is adjacent to the village of Staverton (a separate parish) and the Canal Road industrial estate (part of Trowbridge). In the north, beyond the Kennet and Avon Canal, is the rural hamlet of Whaddon.
The Bristol Avon forms part of the parish's northern boundary. The Paxcroft Brook, a tributary of the River Biss, crosses the south of the parish.
From the 16th century the Long family were landowners at Hilperton and Whaddon. Hilperton House dates from the 18th century and is Grade II* listed.
A school with 100 places was built near the church c. 1840 and replaced with a larger building in 1875, which by 1893 was attended by 122 children on average. All ages attended until 1931, when it was reorganised into an infant school and junior school; it became voluntary controlled in 1948. Responding to the increase in population, a new school was opened in 1970 a short distance to the north, and was attended by 151 in 2004.
The ancient parish of Whaddon was merged with Semington in 1894, then transferred to Hilperton in the late 20th century.
The population of the parish was 748 in the 1801 census and little changed at 825 in 1951, but by 1971 had more than doubled to 1,928 and by 2011 had again increased to 4,967.
A 2016 community governance review extended the Trowbridge boundary north-east into Hilperton, effective April 2017. The area transferred to Trowbridge, lying south of Hilperton Drive, has around 260 houses, The Mead primary school, and a local shopping centre with a Budgens supermarket and the Red Admiral pub.
St Mary's church at Hilperton Marsh was built as a chapel of ease in 1889, using prefabricated corrugated iron components. After further funds were raised, a chancel in stone and flint was added in 1899; the church also gained the 19th-century font from St Michael's. Services were influenced by the Anglo-Catholic Oxford Movement. Changes in 1954 created the parish of Staverton with Hilperton Marsh, where St Mary's became the sole church on the closure of the older St Paul's church at Staverton in 2011.
Whaddon's Church of St Mary is from the 12th and 14th centuries; a chapel for the Long family (later of Rood Ashton House) was added in 1770, and the chancel and bellcote were rebuilt in 1879. 12th-century stones survive, although rearranged, in the north (blocked) and south doorways. The church was designated as Grade II* listed in 1988.
Today the two Hilperton churches, together with those at Whaddon and Semington, comprise the Canalside Benefice.
For Westminster elections, Hilperton is part of the South West Wiltshire constituency, which has been held since 2010 by Andrew Murrison for the Conservatives. Boundary changes which came into effect at the 2024 general election transferred the parish out of the Chippenham constituency to join Trowbridge in South Wiltshire.
The Kennet and Avon Canal crosses the rural northern section of the parish and forms the western boundary of Hilperton Marsh, where there is a marina.
The village school continues as Hilperton CE Primary School. The south of the parish is served by The Mead Community Primary School at Paxcroft Mead, which was in Hilperton parish when it opened in 2001 but is within the area transferred to Trowbridge in 2017. Castle Mead School, another primary school in Trowbridge parish, is nearby.
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