Heritage Statement and listed building consent for an Arts and Crafts house built for Ambrose Heal.

Brewer’s plans against the house as it stands.

We inspected the house room by room in November 2022 and compared Brewer’s original plans, and his plans for the later extension, with the layout as it exists. The research also drew on Ordnance Survey maps from the 1870s to 1960 and on published accounts, including Lawrence Weaver’s survey of small country houses of 1911.

The special interest of the house lies in its design, in how much of the exterior and interior survives, and in its association with Heal, Brewer and Smith. The form of the fives court can still be read in the two rear wings, though the court itself has gone. The conservatory that now occupies it is of no significance.

Evidence for what had already changed.

The conservation officer’s first response to the scheme was that several of the internal alterations would affect the historic plan. The comparison of plans gave a factual answer on each point: the wall between kitchen and dining room, and the circulation around it, had already been altered in the later twentieth century, and one of the rooms in question had been reduced and given a new use when the house was first extended.

Where the officer’s concerns were well made, the scheme changed. An injected damp-proof course was dropped in favour of lowering the external ground levels and improving drainage. A proposed merging of two first floor rooms was omitted. The extension was simplified from a T-shaped plan to a flat-roofed form set in from the wings.

A lower extension, and repair in lime.

The revised extension is lower than the conservatory it replaces and stands clear of the wings, so that more of the court walls can be seen than at present. Our assessment was that the proposals would preserve the special interest of the house and, in that respect, better reveal it.

The repair programme is as important as the alterations. Plasticised masonry paint and failed render are to be removed and the walls re-rendered in lime. Cracks are to be stitched, chimneys, joinery and windows repaired, and plastic rainwater goods replaced in metal. The original radiators are to be reused in an upgraded heating system.

Planning permission for the replacement extension (P/1937/23) was granted on 30 October 2023. The Heritage Statement was revised as the internal proposals were refined, with the final version issued in May 2024, and listed building consent (PL/0438/23) was granted on 31 July 2024.