It is 16 kilometres (10 mi) southeast of New Plymouth on State Highway 3, close to Mount Taranaki, and sits 200 metres (660 ft) above sea level.

Despite its small population, the town has gained notoriety from a string of violent crimes which tend toward the gruesome,[7][8] bizarre[9][10][11][12] and barbaric.

While the national murder rate is about two per hundred thousand per annum, my hometown boasts a rate of twenty five per hundred thousand—not alarming by US standards (Inglewood, California has thirteen murders per thousand yet is safer than 25 percent of cities in the U.S.), but troubling for New Zealanders.

It isn't just the discrepancy between the pastoral appearance of my hometown and its hidden history of violence that is so mystifying; it is the brutal and bizarre form that this violence takes.A number of buildings are listed by Heritage New Zealand.

[15] The Shoe Store Building on the corner of Rata and Richmond Streets is one of eight listed as Category II.

It features the Matamua meeting house, and is affiliated with the Te Āti Awa hapū of Pukerangiora.

[17][18] In October 2020, the Government committed $817,845 from the Provincial Growth Fund to upgrade it and Muru Raupatu marae, creating 15 jobs.

[27] Inglewood has produced four All Blacks (John Major, Handley Brown, Dave "Trapper" Loveridge, Chris Masoe), and a leading contemporary artist, Michael Stevenson, who represented New Zealand at the 2003 Venice Biennale.