Description

698-1/0/11186 ALBEMARLE AVENUE
04-DEC-03 DIDSBURY
14
PARK COTTAGE

II
House c.1830, with late C19 or early C20 alterations and additions, and a late C20 glazed lean-to. Red brick, laid to Flemish bond, and incorporating burnt headers for decorative effect. Gable brick stacks and a Welsh slate roof covering.
PLAN: Double-pile plan, the rear pile a late C19 addition.
EXTERIOR: Front elevation a symmetrical 3-bay, 2 storey range with a central doorway within a rubbed brick semi-circular arched opening. 3-step approach to doorway, with 8-panel part-glazed door below semi-circular overlight. Flanking the doorway are 8 over 8 pane hornless sash windows beneath rubbed brick flat-arched heads. 3 upper floor windows are of matching detail, and all sit on painted projecting sills. Rear elevation with late C19 sash windows without glazing bars C20 casement frames. Rear pile has projecting full-height stacks at either gable end. Front pile is slate-hung to south side. Two storey attached outbuilding with blocked upper window, possibly predating rear pile of house, and contemporary single storey attached outbuilding. C20 lean to at side of no interest.
INTERIOR: Front door leads to entrance hall with principal rooms to right and left. That to right has been opened out to the rear to form a single room the full depth of the earlier part of the house. It has original cornices and skirtings, fireplace later. The left hand room has had a window inserted to the side, cornices, skirting and fireplace original. The entrance to the room has been made into a wide arch, echoed in the entrance arch to the rear pile of the house. To the rear is a small room, probably originally a service room, now a bathroom. The rear pile consists of a dining room with inserted French windows to the side, to the left, and a kitchen to the right with a central small utility room. The dog-leg staircase, running from the front entrance hall, is original and has a fine turned wooden newel and cap, with cut string and carved brackets below the treads,and stick balusters. The fist floor has four rooms to the front pile, several with original fireplaces and built-in cupboards, and two larger rooms to the rear pile built partly into the eaves. The roof timbers appeared to be hand cut.
HISTORY: The building is thought to have been the administrative centre for the once-extensive Egerton Estate, though this is disputed.

A very uncommon survival of an early C19 dwelling designed for a rural environment, now embedded in a densely-populated urban quarter. The house is of special architectural interest as an indicator of the character, scale and detail of the buildings of a now-transformed rural landscape.

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26670145

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

• 
  Devon (Pevsner Buildings of England)
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  The green guide for historic buildings: how to improve the environmental performance of listed and historic buildings
• 
  England's Post-War Listed Buildings
• 
  Churches: An Architectural Guide (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Introductions)
• 
  Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, and Peterborough (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)