Summary
A house, built between 1810-1840, now subdivided into flats.
Reasons for Designation
122 and 122a Castle Hill, Reading, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
Architectural interest:
* as an early-C19 building which contributes to the character of an architecturally varied historic streetscape.
Historic interest:
* as part of the historic urban development of Reading.
Group value:
* the building is in close proximity to a large number of listed buildings and forms part of a strong historic grouping.
History
Until the C19, most of the land west of Reading town centre was open farmland crossed by two ancient routes passing from London to the West Country. Today, the northern of these is named Oxford Road, while the southern is Castle Street, Castle Hill and Bath Road. Inns and isolated dwellings likely existed on these roads before the C18. Fortifications were built throughout the area by Royalist forces garrisoned in the town during the Civil War with some of the earthworks surviving into the early C19.
From the early C18, development slowly began to spread westward along Castle Hill/Bath Road and Oxford Road. John Rocque’s Map of Berkshire of 1761 depicts ribbon development along Castle Hill/Bath Road extending as far as the junction with Tilehurst Road, and individual houses along Oxford Road roughly as far as the present-day Russell Street. More comprehensive development of the area began in the early C19 and progressed gradually over the 100 years. Development spread further along Castle Street/Castle Hill, with some of the earlier buildings depicted on Rocque’s map seemingly replaced. North-south link roads were also laid out across the market gardens that previously existed between Oxford Road and Bath Road. Terraced housing was erected in considerable quantities during the first half of the century to cater for a variety of social groups.
122 Castle Hill (formerly known as Culham House and originally 122 Castle Street), was built sometime between the late 1810s and late 1830s, probably on the site of an earlier coaching inn during the westward growth of Reading’s inner suburbs along Castle Hill and Bath Road. The house is first mentioned in a newspaper article relating to its sale in 1841. However, the first description of the building appears in an article of 1851 relating to another sale, in which it is described as ‘a very Desirable Private RESIDENCE…containing on the ground floor, Entrance Hall, 2 Parlours, good Dining room, Kitchen, and Scullery; on the first floor, 3 Bed Rooms and a pleasant Drawing Room; on the second floor 2 Bed Rooms and Attic; well-stocked Garden, small Greenhouse, good Cellarage, &c.’.
There appears to have been a historic relationship with the adjoining Castle Tap public house (National Heritage List for England entry 1113428), which is said to have been rebuilt in 1823. The western bay of the public house shares the proportions and some design elements of the two-storey west wing of 122 Castle Hill which creates a somewhat symmetrical composition comprising a central three-storey, three-bay building with two-storey, one-bay wings to either side. The nature of the relationship between these two properties is unknown, although by 1879, the current arrangement of a small public house adjoining a large house had been established. The pedimented westernmost section of 122 Castle Hill had also been added by 1879 and was probably originally used as a coach house.
Details of the house’s auction in 1906 suggest it had been enlarged and possibly altered internally by this date, describing it as a freehold family residence ‘containing 5 reception and 9 bedrooms (suitable for school or boarding house, or convertible into shops) with stabling and a large garden part available for building’.
The garden was progressively developed with a series of outbuildings starting in the 1910s, eventually housing a builders’ yard by the late 1950s. Ownership of the property was split into two as 122 and 122a Castle Hill sometime between 1931 and 1957, while the builders’ yard was on a separate plot. In the 1960s, the builders’ yard was demolished and replaced with the community centre, Walford Hall.
By 1981, the main building had been converted to office use and a series of different organisations passed through the building until the mid-2010s. The west wing (122a Castle Hill in 2024) was used as a shop and gallery during the late C20 and early C21 but was converted to flats in around 2017.
Details
House, built between 1810-1840, now subdivided into flats.
MATERIALS: stuccoed, possibly with painted stone door and window surrounds, and a roof covering of slate. The western elevation on Carey Street is painted brick.
PLAN: there are two principal elements to the building: a symmetrical building of three storeys plus basement across three bays to the east and a one- to two-storey wing to the west, slightly recessed from the main building, possibly of two phases.
EXTERIOR: the entire Castle Hill frontage is stuccoed and painted. The stucco is channelled on the ground floor with a plat band above, and with rusticated quoins on either side of the three-storey main building. The ground floor of the three-storey element is symmetrically laid out, with a large central stucco doorcase, possibly a later addition or replacement, within which sits a three-panelled door with fluted quarter columns and a fanlight with curved glazing above. To either side of the door is a six-over-six sash window with a semi-circular iron grate beneath covering a light well to the basement.
The first and second floors each contain three timber sash windows (six-over-six to the first floor, three-over-three to the second floor) within moulded surrounds. Between the central first- and second-floor windows of the central bay is a raised oval panel which formerly contained the words ‘CULHAM HOUSE’. Above the second-floor windows is a corniced parapet which conceals the main building’s hipped slate roof.
The west wing at the junction of Carey Street (122a) is in two sections. The eastern section, adjoining the main building, carries a single two-pane sash window at the ground and first floors, that on the first floor housed within a moulded surround matching those of the main building, and a parapet cornice also matching that of the main building, concealing a hipped slate roof. The one-and-a-half-storey western section carries a five-panelled door under a round-arched fanlight and a large segmental-arched former shopfront containing a fixed three-light timber window. This westernmost element has a pedimented parapet concealing a pitched slate roof.
The rear elevation of the building is partially visible from the street. It is smooth rendered and painted in the same colours as the main north frontage and contains a variety of historic and modern windows. The ground floor of the two-storey west wing is bowed. There is a bowed single-storey extension on the main building along the eastern party wall with 120 Castle Hill.
