Description

TL 2234 LETCHWORTH CROFT LANE
(North side)

948/5/10003 Nos.5 AND 7

- II

A pair of semi-detached cottages. 1905-6 with late C20 alterations and additions. By Geoffrey Lucas, architect. Roughcast walls on a brick plinth, plain tile roof covering and 2 brick ridge stacks with decorative capping courses. PLAN: linear range with weatherboarded offshut to front forming back-to-back entrance porches. EXTERIOR: front (south) elevation; one-and-a-half storeys, 3 bays, with central weatherboarded lean-to offshut, flanked by 4-light side-hung casement windows with glazing bars, one to each cottage. Offshut has 2 small 4-pane pivot windows, and doorways in the returns, No.7 (right) with original plank door and frame. First floor with 3 wide gabled dormer windows, with weatherboarded apexes. The centre dormer is shared, and has coupled 2-light casements. The outer dormers have tripartite casements, arranged 1:2:1, the central lights fixed. The rear of No.7 has a late C20 conservatory. INTERIORS: No.5 retains original fittings, including plank doors with contemporary ironmongery, a winder stair with plain balusters, and fitted bedroom cupboards. The cottages were built in the earliest phase of development of the Letchworth Garden City, and clearly demonstrate, by means of their size, plan form and detailing, the aim of providing affordable small-scale housing. Geoffrey Lucas was awarded the prize for the grouped cottages category in the Cheap Cottage Exhibition of 1905, organised to demonstrate how affordable housing could be provided for the rural worker.

Listing NGR: TL2239434153

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26537858

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Historic Environment Law: Planning, Listed Buildings, Monuments, Conservation Areas and Objects by Harwood, Richard (2012) Paperback
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990
• 
  Oxfordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Pevsner's Architectural Glossary (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Introductions)
• 
  Harrow on the Hill: A photographic portrayal of listed buildings and structures (Historic Buildings Picture Guides)