Description

SP 9433-9533
8/98

WOBURN
BEDFORD STREET (West Side)
Nos 16 to 45 (consecutive)

GV
II
Row of Bedford Estate cottages erected by the Seventh Duke of Bedford. Dated 1846. Reddish brown brick with dressings in a lighter red brick. C20 tile roofs.

Two storeyed row with road elevation in three sections. Central section consists of a pair of slightly projecting gables. Left hand section is in three bays, with gable to left hand and gablet to each of others. Right hand section, also in three bays, has gable to centre and gable to left hand. Ground floor has 3:2:3 three-light windows. First floor has 3:2:2 two-light windows and a narrow single light to centre. All are casements with glazing bars and wood mullions, under gauged brick flat heads. 2:2:2 doorways, all with flat heads and dripstones and containing doors of three vertical panels. Variety of multiple ridge stacks. Right hand angle of row is chamfered at ground floor level with ornamental stop.

The Seventh Duke of Bedford recognised the advantages of housing agricultural labourers in comfortable cottages. From the late 1840s onwards the emphasis in Bedford Estate cottage building was on the utilitarian rather than the Picturesque. The quality of construction of this humble type of dwelling is remarkably high for such an early date. The cottages can be seen as an influential contribution to the development of working class housing which culminated in garden cities and early council housing. The Dukes of Bedford built about 500 cottages in the locality between the late 1840s and World War I. This row of cottages is particularly good example of this early, deliberately plain type of building, and is similar to designs in the Seventh Duke's Plans and Elevations.

The (7th) Duke of Bedford: Plans and Elevations of cottages for Agricultural Labourers, London, 1850 (reprint of letter and plans sent 1849 to Earl of Chichester, President of Royal Agricultural Society); The (11th) Duke of Bedford: A great Agricultural Estate, being the Story of the Origin and Administration of Woburn and Thorney, London, 1897; Rev. C H Hartshorne; The System of building Labourers' Cottages pursued on the estate of His Grace the Duke of Bedford, nd but probably 1849.

Listing NGR: SP9486433299

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26407815

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

• 
  Liverpool: Pevsner City Guide (Pevsner Architectural Guides: City Guides)
• 
  Northumberland (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Wiltshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Kent: North East and East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Gloucestershire 2: The Vale and The Forest of Dean: Vale and Forest of Dean Pt. 2 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Development and Design of Heritage Sensitive Sites: Strategies for Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas