4-25, Bristol Street including yard walls
4-25, Bristol Street, Swindon, SN1 5EQ
Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places
Overview
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- II
- List Entry Number:
- 1023465
- Date first listed:
- 17-Feb-1970
- List Entry Name:
- 4-25, Bristol Street including yard walls
- Statutory Address:
- 4-25, Bristol Street, Swindon, SN1 5EQ
Location
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Images of England Project
- Date:
- 2001-05-20
- Reference:
- IOE01/04107/22
- Rights:
- © Dr Robert Slade. Source: Historic England Archive
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Official list entry
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- II
- List Entry Number:
- 1023465
- Date first listed:
- 17-Feb-1970
- List Entry Name:
- 4-25, Bristol Street including yard walls
- Statutory Address 1:
- 4-25, Bristol Street, Swindon, SN1 5EQ
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
Location
- Statutory Address:
- 4-25, Bristol Street, Swindon, SN1 5EQ
The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.
- District:
- Swindon (Unitary Authority)
- Parish:
- South Swindon
- National Grid Reference:
- SU 14462 84760
Details
This list entry was subject to a Minor Enhancement on 23/04/2020
SU 1484 NW
SU 1484 NE
5/21 and 6/21
SWINDON
BRISTOL STREET (south side)
Nos. 4 - 25 including yard walls
17.2.70
GV
II
In order to house the workforce for the new Great Western Railway works, IK Brunel designed a new village to the south of the railway line. Brunel’s early layout drawings of 1840 show a grid similar to the final plan of 12 terraces in six blocks on either side of the High Street (from 1893 Emlyn Square). Construction started in 1842, and by 1855 most of the buildings had been completed. Houses and cottages of different types were built, as well as lodging houses. Brunel himself designed only the first block of 1842 (4-25 Bristol Street); as it was visible from the railway line, this is in a more decorative style than the others.
The financial difficulties of the contractors JD and C Rigby, who undertook to build 300 cottages but only completed 130, delayed the completion of the village until the 1850s. The cottages to the west of Emlyn Square were built first (1842-1843), followed by those on the east side (1845-1847). The end blocks towards Emlyn Square, containing corner shops on the ground floor, were built in 1845-1847, and the remainder, mostly end blocks on the outer ends of the streets, were built in 1853-1855. In 1966, the local authority acquired the cottages from British Rail and restored them. The village is one of Britain’s best-preserved and architecturally most ambitious railway settlements.
Terrace of 22 cottages, 1842 for Great Western Railway Company. Coursed limestone rubble with ashlar quoins and dressings. Slate roofs. Ashlar stacks with diagonal shafts set on party walls. Two storey, each house one bay with side passage, two rooms deep. Chamfered and painted window and door surrounds, latter with pyramidal stops. Doors inset on splay under bracketed canopy. Alternate pairs of cottages have gables over slightly projecting window bays. Ground floor casement windows with upper panes. Four-pane casements to first floor. Rubble stone outbuilding and brick walls to rear yards with hogs-back blue copings. C20 continuous rear lean-to. Extensively renovated c1974. Similar to Nos. 30-51 Bathampton Street (q.v.).
Listing NGR: SU1446284760
Legacy
The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.
- Legacy System number:
- 318681
- Legacy System:
- LBS
Sources
Books and journals
Large, F, Swindon Retrospect 1855-1930, (1931)
Peck, A, The Great Western at Swindon Works, (1983)
Silto, J, A Swindon History 1840-1901, ()
Hudson, K, Transport History, ()
Cattell, J, Falconer, K, Swindon: The Legacy of a Railway Town (RCHME), (1995), 44-47, 155-156
Legal
This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.
Map
This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale. This copy shows the entry on 11-Jun-2026 at 20:44:44.
Download a full scale map (PDF)End of official list entry
All text content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0 , except where otherwise stated. Any supplied maps are © Crown Copyright [and database rights] 2026 OS AC0000815036 and may not be reproduced without permission.