3 & 5, STRATFORD ROAD

Details

811/8/502 STRATFORD ROAD 19-MAR-1973 3 & 5 (Formerly listed as: STRATFORD ROAD 3)

II

Two cottages, formerly a single house, dating from the late C17 or very early C18, perhaps incorporating some earlier fabric, and with extensions of the C19 and C20.

MATERIALS: The building is at least partially timber framed, the ground floor partly clad in limestone, the remainder and the first floors in brick, set under plain clay tile roofs, with brick stacks.

PLAN: The original house was a two-room plan, oriented roughly north-south. There are extensions to the rear of both cottages; in addition, number 3 has a small lean-to set against its northern wall, and number 5 has been extended by two full-height bays to the south.

EXTERIOR: The building is of two storeys and four bays, the third having an entrance door to 5 Stratford Road. The ground floor of the original building is in stone, with the southern extensions and the first floor in brick. The windows are timber casements of two and three lights set under timber lintels; the northern bay has two openings each to ground and first floors, the northernmost on each floor being blocked. The northern return has some exposed timber framing, as well as housing the entrance to 3 Stratford Road. The rear is rather irregular, with a succession of later extensions, though the original southern return is visible, constructed in stone.

INTERIOR: The interior of 5 Stratford Road retains very heavy section chamfered beams with scroll end stops to both ground and first floor, and ceiling joists. The original external wall plate is visible within the first floor rear extension. An inglenook fireplace survives in the ground floor of each cottage, and 5 Stratford Road has a late C19 cast iron fireplace in the first floor room above. The attic is partly accessible, and has a simple A-frame truss and single purlins.

SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: To the roadside, the properties are closely bounded by a stone wall with coped top, which has a Tudor-arched gateway leading to 5 Stratford Road; the wall forms part of the western boundary to the Warwick Castle estate.

HISTORY: Documentary records relating to the site are unusually complete for the period 1669 to 1790. It was formerly the site of St Leonard's chapel, which by 1669, when it was sold by John Cooper, a tanner, to the baker Jonathan Brookes for £65, was described as 'decayed'; it had fallen out of use as a chapel and was by this time used as a barn. The deeds record the sale in 1703 by John Brookes to Richard Walker of the site, now described as a new message 'where stood decayed St Lawrence Chapell', occupied by a Nicholas Faulkener. This clearly implies that there was a largely new building erected on the site at this date. It continued in the Walker family's ownership until 1738, then in the Norton family until 1766, when it was sold to Thomas Pestell. By 1790 it was in the ownership of the Rt Hon George, Earl Brooke. At some point in the late C19 or early C20, the site was purchased by the Warwick Castle estate, on whose western fringes it sits, and in the mid-C20, was sold again. Ordnance Survey mapping shows that the building, in a slightly shorter form than the present footprint, was still a single dwelling in 1889; the earlier house had apparently been extended by one bay to the south during the C19. By 1905, the building had been divided into two cottages, in which form it remained until some point after 1925. It was extended to the south by a further bay in the mid-C20.

SOURCES: A History of the County of Warwick (Victoria County History): Volume 8: The City of Coventry and Borough of Warwick (1969) 434-447

REASONS FOR DESIGNATION DECISION: 3 and 5 Stratford Road are listed at Grade II, for the following principal reasons: * The two cottages were originally part of the same house, dating from the final years of the C17 or the first three years of the C18 * The building retains good evidence of its original plan form, materials and construction, with good details such as the heavy section chamfered and stopped ceiling beams * The later extensions to the east and south do not detract from the special architectural and historic interest of the original building

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

307656

Legacy System:

LBS

End of official list entry

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