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SCAS Newsletter Contact: Nick Knight [[email protected]] with your ideas Page 1
Conservation Area Society (SCAS)
Newsletter December 2018 Stoneygate
SCAS Chair: David Oldershaw SCAS Website: www.stoneygateconservation.org
Newsletter: Nita Foale, Nick Knight Printed by: AVS-Print, University of Leicester
Swallowcroft: Country House Elegance in the City
Even in an area of such fine domestic architecture as Stoneygate, Ratcliffe Road stands out. There are two grand houses, Knighton Hayes and Knighton Spinneys, set in `mini estates’; Inglewood an outstanding arts and crafts design by Ernest Gimson; a fine example of an inter-war art-deco villa at No10; several domestic revival houses by leading local architects and an imposing group of three houses by Amos Hall (Nos. 34-38) of which Swallowcroft (No 36) is the centerpiece.
These three Grade II listed residences, designed in a `domestic free style’ were built for wealthy hosiery manufacturer John Haines; one for his daughter as a wedding present, one as an investment and Swallowcroft as his family home. They make a handsome group, well hidden behind mature trees and greenery, revealing from the road tantalising glimpses of angled rooflines, wide gables and tall chimney stacks. The scale is impressive and little is given away by the front courtyard area as architect Amos Hall skillfully ensures that virtually all the principal rooms take advantage of the delightful south-facing views across the rear garden. From here, laid out with 140
rose bushes and a bank of thirty hydrangeas, there is a stunning view of the house, which, with its multi-paned bay windows, matching dormers and gentle asymmetry, contrasts with the brick, stone and gables of its neighbours; the whole group being surmounted by a vast clay-tiled roof and lofty polygonal chimney stacks.
The land on which these houses and Inglewood were built was owned by the Harris family of nearby Knighton House. It was due to be sold to the architect Isaac Barradale but he died in 1892 before the transaction could be completed and Amos Hall took it over as the successor to Barradale’s practice. Both he and Ernest Gimson
were pupils of Barradale but it was Hall who remained in Leicester with his master.
In the 126 years of its existence, Swallowcroft has had just five owners. Following
the death of Mr and Mrs Haines, in 1922 it passed to the architect James Stockdale Harrison for the price of £3,000. It was sold again in 1931 (this time for £3,050) to another hosiery manufacturer, John Lorrimer who lived there for seven years before
selling to W. Percy Main for a thousand pounds less than he paid for it. Finally, in 1971 it was acquired by the present owners (to whom I’m grateful for much of the above information) for £11,750. The house has always been in private ownership and has clearly been cherished over the years as almost all the original features are intact and in excellent condition. Even the butler’s pantry still has its glazed
wooden cupboards, Belfast sink and wooden draining boards.
SCAS Newsletter Contact: Nick Knight [[email protected]] with your ideas Page 2
When you walk into Swallowcroft there is the feeling of entering a fine country house. As you approach from the courtyard, a sturdy front door opens into a substantial lobby and then through an inner door into the long, tiled hallway. This widens into an impressive arched central space, the focal point of which is the magnificent angled, open-well staircase rising through three floors and giving a fine view to the top floor ceiling, thirty-six feet above. It is now that the sheer scale of the house becomes clear.
The ground floor has a drawing room, dining room, breakfast room, kitchen, butler’s pantry, cloakroom and service staircase. On the upper floors there are eight bedrooms and three bathrooms and outside, garaging and covered storage in the old service wing and yard.
The drawing room measures twenty-three feet into the wide bay window by seventeen and a half feet into the alcoves. A door opens from the centre of the bay into the substantial garden. Due to its southern aspect, the room is flooded with light and despite its impressive measurements, it has a comfortable, welcoming feel to it due no doubt to the excellence of its proportions, its attractive furnishings and beautiful fabrics. The dining room is also of impressive size measuring 22ft 6in by 16ft 4in and this too includes a fine bay window with door to the garden. Facing the window is an attractive arched recess, a feature that is seen in other parts of the house. The proportions of the room allow for a large dining table, chairs, sideboard and serving table. Both drawing and dining rooms have splendid chimneypieces with stepped architraves and marble insets. Their striking design has a lightness of touch that is characteristic of all the features of Swallowcroft. The breakfast room and kitchen face the front courtyard at right-angles to each other. Modern fittings combine well with period features including glazed cupboards and original tiles.
The polished mahogany staircase is one of the finest features of the house and leads to a bright and spacious first floor landing where the principal bedroom is directly above the drawing room. It has another striking fireplace, similar in style to those downstairs and either side, twin arched alcoves. It also has a splendid view of the garden and beyond. The second bedroom is above the dining room and shares the view. The country house quality of Swallowcroft is enhanced by the fact that from these windows the views are so well wooded and verdant that from certain angles no buildings are visible at all. When the house was built it was on the edge of the town and the spacious grounds of the surrounding properties have preserved the quasi-rural character of area. Two further bedrooms (one used as a study), two bathrooms, original panelled linen cupboards and dressing area
complete the accommodation on the first floor.
Continuing up to the top floor, there is a large south facing bedroom with a truly spectacular view and another fine chimney piece, a library with fitted shelves with cupboards below, two further bedrooms and another bathroom.
It is to the owners’ great credit that they have resisted the
trend to over-modernise by knocking down walls and combining rooms. As a result they have maintained
Swallowcroft’s integrity and created an exceptional period home that is both original and stylish.
SCAS Newsletter Contact: Nick Knight [[email protected]] with your ideas Page 3
Victorian Society —2019 Spring Programme Tuesday 8th Jan. 7.30pm William Flint: Leicester’s Classical Architect Mark Mitchley William Flint (1801-1862) is one of Leicester’s most influential and yet least known early nineteenth century architects. This talk will look at his life, his masters, partners and pupils and the buildings he designed. Mark Mitchley is a head teacher and a passionate amateur historian who lived in a Flint house for ten years.
Tuesday 5th Feb. 7.15pm Stoneywell Cottage and the Gimsons Alan Tyler One of Leicestershire's only two National Trust properties, Stoneywell Cottage was designed in 1898 by local architect, designer and craftsman Ernest Gimson for his elder brother Sydney and his wife Jeanie, remaining in the family until 2012. The talk will cover the construction of cottage, stables and gardens and introduce us to the generations of Gimsons who lived there. (This talk will be preceded by the Leicester Group AGM)
Tuesday 5th March 7.30pm Ada Lovelace: The Calculating Countess Hugh Beavin Ada Lovelace (Byron's only legitimate daughter) grew up at Kirkby Mallory Hall and subsequently became a prominent scientist and mathematician as well as a gifted poet and linguist. She worked with Charles Babbage in the 1840s on his ‘Difference Engine’ and is now regarded as the first computer programmer. Hugh Beavin edited the `Hinckley Historian’ for 35 years and is author of several Hinckley histories. He was a founder/chair of the Hinckley Local History Group and the Hinckley & District Museum and is now its president.
Tuesday 2nd April 7.30pm Highgate Cemetery: A Great Garden of Death Ian Dungavell Highgate was one of London’s first commercial cemeteries and became so popular that the number of picnicking Sunday visitors had to be limited. It is the final resting place of many famous people including Karl Marx, George Eliot and Michael Faraday. Dr Ian Dungavell is an architectural historian & Chief Executive of the Friends of Highgate Cemetery Trust. He has been a member of the Victorian Society for 25 years and was Director from 2000-12.
All talks take place in the Bishop Street Methodist Church, Town Hall Square. Non-members are welcome (pay on the door £2.50).
The Architect
Amos Hall was born in Leicester in 1858 and was articled to the distinguished Leicester architect Isaac Barradale, working alongside him until Barradale’s death in 1892. He then succeeded to the practice, which he continued to run until his own
retirement. He died in 1930.
Hall was responsible for some notable houses in and around Leicester, including the magnificent but short-lived Ratcliffe House, a grand 15th century style mansion that once occupied the entire area where the forty-two houses of Sackville Gardens stand today. He designed the Silver Arcade in Leicester city centre and also the Belvoir Street façade of the Grand Hotel, which incorporates the King’s Hall and the former Winter Garden along with the “wedding cake” tower on the corner of Granby Street.
In 1897 Hall designed his own house, Woodbrook, a substantial arts and crafts style villa, described in a contemporary publication as being “near the turnpike leading from Leicester to Ashby”. It’s still there today and stands on the western corner of Station Road Glenfield and the A50 (Groby Road).
Neil Crutchley
University of Leicester Community Liaison Group This forum for communication and consultation between the University and its neighbours has met 3 times this year. Members include university officers, students, local councillors, city wardens, police officers and representatives from community groups like ourselves. Discussion has focussed on the perennial issues associated with student occupancy (bins, late-night noise, car parking etc) and the University’s development projects in which we are particularly interested. SCAS members and local residents have already met to identify concerns about the Mary Gee Houses site in Ratcliffe Road. The University tell us that 15 bids have been received from prospective developers and they `will be in a position to select a preferred bidder shortly’. The next meeting is in January and we will keep you informed.
SCAS Newsletter Contact: Nick Knight [[email protected]] with your ideas Page 4
More Stoneygate Conundrums and Connections
In October ex-Shanklin Drive resident Elaine Thomas wrote to us via the SCAS website:
I would be interested in any information about a large detached house on London Road which was demolished, I think, in the 1960s. By that time it had been empty and deserted for some years and as a child in the 1950s/60s I played around (and occasionally in) the house - although it was strictly forbidden. It would be on the left side going towards town, before Victoria Park Road, and somewhere near the Leicester Squash Club (I haven't lived in Leicester since 1971, so a bit hazy). It looked regency style. Any ideas? It has always intrigued me and I have never found a photo.
Readers will know that we are always happy to take up this sort of challenge. The stretch of London Road nearest the Mayfield roundabout saw a lot of changes in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Large Victorian houses in extensive grounds were no longer attractive to families and, as their remaining owners died or moved out, without conservation area protection and with no viable alternative commercial or institutional uses, they were acquired by developers, demolished and replaced by flat blocks, estates of maisonette-type housing and lock-up garages. Many of these took their names and it was here that committee members Neil Crutchley and Nick Knight first turned. Perhaps Elaine was thinking of The Cedars (demolished and replaced by Cedars Court in 1960)? Or Hollybank (demolished and replaced in 1962 by Hollybank Court)? Maybe Buckhurst, the old Church of England Childrens’ Home (demolished in 1964 and replaced in 1971 by Victoria Gardens)? Or The Firs, Stoneygate’s oldest surviving property, which still exists but which we thought was a doctors’ surgery during the 1950s? Elaine ruled out all of our candidates but added a crucial piece of information –`my friend kept her pony in a nearby, rented, field (I think behind the house), which is why we knew it was there’.
Only one property ticked all those boxes; The Stoney Gate, which stood on the site now occupied by the Dukes Drive flats. Its grounds extended to Clarendon Park Road and, until the St John the Baptist Primary School was built in the mid 1970s, the southernmost fields were used as a paddock and home to a temporary health centre. As the photo from a 1972 Leicester Mercury article {below) shows, relations between horses and nurses were very neighbourly! The Stoney Gate was a late seventeenth century farmhouse, later remodelled as a
`gentleman's residence' and acquired during the Victorian era by the Freer family who retained it for almost a hundred years. In 1945 it passed to Mr Tony d`Offay and his wife and after they moved to London, efforts to find a buyer were unsuccessful. Despite a rescue campaign led by Professor Arthur Humphries of the University of Leicester, it was finally demolished in 1962.
We sent details and maps and Elaine confirmed that The Stoney Gate was indeed the mystery house. She also delighted us by revealing that she had returned to Leicester in 1967 to follow a Combined Arts degree course at the University and that Professor Arthur Humphries had been one of her
teachers. `It’s lovely to think he tried to save the house. It would be just like him.’ Another bit of Stoneygate serendipity!
Professor
Arthur Humphries
SCAS Newsletter Contact: Nick Knight [[email protected]] with your ideas Page 5
Saturday December 22nd, 7pm St James the Greater, Leicester
Programme includes some well-known Christmas carols, (you’ll be able to join in) plus a few lesser-known works.
Join us after the performance for mulled wine and mince pies Tickets: £10 - at the door or phone: 299 4444
The City of Leicester Singers (COLS) With the Great Central Strummers Ukelele Band
The Mystery of Christmas
Christmas Events at The Guildhall To Book, call The Guildhall on 0116 253 2569
Festive Films at the Guildhall—Sunday 9th December Filmtramp presents a trio of fantastic festive films with a roaring fire and a glass of mulled wine (or hot chocolate!) .
3.00-4.30pm The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992) Cert U 1h 25min Let the Muppet characters tell the classic tale of an old and bitter miser's redemption on Christmas Eve. 5.00-6.50pm Gremlins (1984) Cert 15 1h 46min
A boy inadvertently breaks three important rules concerning his new pet and unleashes a horde of malevolently mischievous monsters on a small town. 7.15-9.30pm It's A Wonderful Life (1946) Cert U 2h 10min An angel is sent from Heaven to help a desperately frustrated businessman by showing him what life would have been like if he had never existed. Tickets £5 - Booking highly recommended
Belshazzar's Feast Tuesday 11th December 8.00-10.30pm A Christmas-themed show by Paul Sartin (of Bellowhead and Faustus) & Paul Hutchinson (of Hoover The Dog) who together wow audiences across the UK with their eclectic and eccentric mix of tunes and between-songs chat that always sends audiences home with smiles on their faces. Tickets £14.
Christmas Wreath Making Thursday 13th Dec 3.00pm In this workshop you will be shown how to make a traditional wreath whilst enjoying mulled wine and mince pies in the fabulous festive surroundings of the Medieval Guildhall. Tickets: £25 per person. All materials are included and no experience is necessary
A Christmas Carol in Concert Sunday 16th December, 8.00-10.00pm A unique retelling of Dickens' heart-warming tale of the transformation of flinty-hearted Ebenezer Scrooge into the epitome of the Christmas spirit, using an array of traditional and modern instruments and authentic musical arrangements by Green Matthews. It brims with warmth, wit and wonder. Tickets £12 / £10. to book call The Guildhall or online at Eventbrite
Kingfisher Chorale - People Look East Mon 17th, Wed 19th and Fri 21st December 8.00pm 3 sparkling concerts with carols drawn from 400 years of music, including popular, new, funny, poignant, sacred and secular carols and songs, there is surely something for everyone. Tickets: £12/ £10.
A Christmas Carol with Gerald Dickens Sunday 23rd December 1.00pm & 7.30pm Performing 26 different Charles Dickens’ characters, Gerald Dickens brings his great great grandfather’s most famous book to vivid and exciting life. With a real fire, mulled wine and mince pies for sale, the perfect way to get in the festive spirit! Book now! £12.50 / £11.50
SCAS Newsletter Contact: Nick Knight [[email protected]] with your ideas Page 6
Planning Matters (September to December 2018)
The Stoneygate Conservation Area Character Appraisal recognises that walls, fences, hedges and other boundary treatments make a defining contribution to the conservation area streetscene. In Clarendon Park Road and adjoining streets like Portland Road, for instance, low bricks walls are a distinguishing feature while in South Stoneygate, close-boarded timber fencing and hedging are more common. In recent years planners have begun to reflect this in their decision-making and attitude to enforcement. New frontages at 12-16 Stoneygate Road have thoughtfully combined hard and soft landscaping and we were pleased to see large, unauthorised glass globe-topped gate pillars that had appeared at 14a
Woodland Avenue in 2015 removed this summer.
We have also been delighted to see owners taking their own initiatives. At the
junction of Avenue Road and Avenue Road extension, a smart replacement close-boarded timber fence and gate have brightened the streetscene and in Toller Road
a long run of dilapidated fencing has been renewed. In Stoneygate Road, owners consulted widely before gaining planning consent for a set of beautiful reclaimed cast iron Victorian railings and a matching gate which they have had fitted to an existing low brick wall - with spectacular results.
Some landlords are, unfortunately, still slow to catch on. A highly distinctive brick wall running along the West Avenue boundary of a
tenanted property in Clarendon Park Road was recently replaced – without planning consent – by a set of timber fence panels. We have asked planners to take appropriate action.
The revised application to use the former Home for Penitent Females at 58 Stoneygate Road as a 35-bed hostel for up to 53 occupants was heard by the planning committee in September. Both neighbours and Councillor Dr Lynn Moore spoke to object and members queried the lack of information about future residents and their management. They also had concerns about the size of rooms and safeguarding issues relating to the use of shared facilities including toilets. It was accepted that some controls over HMOs fell within the remit of Housing and Licensing but members wanted to clarify which issues could be controlled through the planning process. Discussion was deferred until more information is available.
We hear that trees are again being removed without consent from the spinney on the corner of Ratcliffe
and London Roads. In 2007 a government Tree Inspector described the spinney as `high amenity urban woodland’, adding that it `has considerable value in terms of its contribution to the local landscape along a busy road’. The spinney was originally part of the nearby Knighton House estate and was separated from
it when Leicestershire County Council built three houses for senior police officers and an access road in the 1950s. After the spinney was acquired by the present owner in 2000, trees began to disappear and an order to replant them (following an unsuccessful appeal against City Council enforcement action) was not complied with. The owner’s stated intention was to restore the spinney as a `corner of a Victorian garden’ but when applications were made to build a 3-storey, 4-bed house on the northern part of the site in 2009 and a 3-storey, 6-bed house in 2011, we realised that the clearing of trees probably had a different purpose. A Leicester Mercury article
of September 2011 revealed some very surprising details relating to the spinney; not least that the owner had covered it with Tree Preservation Orders in his professional capacity as a City Council planning officer before acquiring it and had then failed to respect the TPOs’ terms. We were very relieved when the City Council replaced them with a new Woodland TPO in Oct 2012 and successfully resisted an appeal from the owner that would have weakened its safeguards. We believe that natural regeneration should be encouraged and every effort made to maintain the spinney as - in the Tree Inspector's words – `a valuable wildlife and conservation feature in the urban environment’; not a potential development site.
SCAS Newsletter Contact: Nick Knight [[email protected]] with your ideas Page 7
We are deeply worried by the planning committee’s decision in October to approve the demolition and replacement of 28 Southernhay Road with a modern 5-bed pastiche-style house, against the advice of the Council’s Conservation Advisory Panel. In her report, the planning case officer wrote `The...building is not considered to be one of the better examples of arts & crafts houses within the Conservation Area. As such, it is only considered to have a neutral impact....its demolition is considered acceptable’. This is a contentious assertion in itself but as a rationale it misinterprets national planning policy and fundamentally misunderstands what a conservation area is; a collection of buildings which have a shared significance and value and reflect a common story through streets or townscape. It is emphatically not just a collection of individually distinguished buildings. This side of Southernhay Road isn’t distinctive because its houses are `arts & crafts’; rather that they reflect a number of inter-war styles and influences of which the arts and crafts movement is one. Breaking this rhythm by inserting a modern house might be justifiable but not when its only distinction is its newness and `neutrality’. Together with the committee Chairman’s gross oversimplification of the issues (`beauty is in the eye of the beholder’), this misguided approach reduces the City Council’s conservation area policies to a beauty contest or talent show, where officer or councillor judgements are purely subjective. It is astonishing that such an important test case could be dealt with so superficially with only two councillors showing any real understanding of the issues at stake. It was claimed that `approval in this case would not set a precedent’. That's exactly what it will do. It represents an existential threat not just to Stoneygate but to all the city's residential conservation areas.
Following the introduction of a new regulation in July, landlords and estate agents now need to follow certain rules when fixing `to let’ signs to
properties in parts of Clarendon Park or to apply for planning consent to vary them. This is good news. Despite the Council’s efforts to establish a voluntary code of practice, some landlords and agents have been using permanent boards as a form of company advertising and they have become a blight – particularly in streets with a large number of rental properties.
We hope, in time, that these improved standards will extend throughout our and neighbouring areas.
Proposals to extend and enlarge the former Knighton House at 341 London Road were amended in September. It is always encouraging when owners show a willingness to listen and the changes would address objections to the loss of mature trees from the entrance and front car park. They would not, however, address equally serious concerns expressed by the City Council’s Conservation Advisory Panel, neighbours and ourselves to the size and design of the planned rear extension whose shape and footprint would remain the same (amendments are to the colour of the brickwork and smaller side windows only). We are also disappointed that the applicants are seeking 14 extra car parking spaces on the rear lawn and that, rather than taking up CAP's suggestion that a modular grass grid system should be installed in the front car park, they want to extend the existing hard standing.
In Brief
4 St Johns Road Change house to 4 flats (3x 1-bed, 1x 2-bed); 1-storey rear extension; alterations PENDING 26 Southernhay Road 2.1m high gates at side PENDING
69 Stoneygate Road Alterations to front, steps, walls and garage canopy PENDING
19 St Johns Road CoU from surgery to house (3-bed); demolish side extension and garage; 3-storey detached house (4-bed); alterations (amended plans) CONDITIONALLY APPROVED
11 Elmfield Avenue Variation of Condition 24 (Plans) to 20180227 (increase bedrooms from 68 to 69; revise drainage scheme; fell 1 tree (T1); works to trees; alterations to boundary treatments; raised decks PENDING
56 Knighton Drive Replacement front windows PENDING
31 Springfield Road 1.83m fence/gate; alterations to side of house PENDING 19 Woodland Avenue Replacement front windows PENDING
3 Southernhay Road Works to 1 tree, TPO 483 PENDING
8 North Avenue 2-storey side extension & dormer; roof alterations CONDITIONALLY APPROVED
Matt Matthew, Nick Knight and Jill Reville
SCAS Newsletter Contact: Nick Knight [[email protected]] with your ideas Page 8
Merry Christmas
and a
Happy New Year
to all our Members from the
SCAS Committee
Doors open 6.30pm for 7.00pm start Tickets £8 including mince pies & mulled wine
07711054622 [email protected]
12th December—7.30pm St. Mary Magdalen Church, Church Lane, Knighton.
Membership News
As we approach Christmas and the New Year, we are delighted that SCAS membership remains healthy. We have never made self-promotion a priority but in recent years we have noticed two interesting trends. The first is that more relatively younger conservation area residents are becoming members. The second is that nearly 40% of members now live outside the conservation area , many of them just beyond the boundaries in South and East Knighton, North Stoneygate and Evington. It occurred to us that both of these groups might respond positively to a promotional effort that was a bit more systematic than our deliveries of complimentary newsletters and leaflets have been in the past. So…we have decided to `up our game’ and have begun delivering nearly 1,600 leaflets to a wide range of addresses both inside and just outside the conservation area. If your non-member friends or neighbours mention it in conversation, please feel free to encourage them to join. And, as always, we thank you all for your continuing support.
SCAS Coach Trip 2019 Following the success of our August coach trip to Taylor’s Loughborough Bell Foundry and Melbourne Hall in Derbyshire, our ever-reliable and ever-imaginative events organiser, Arthur Stafford, has been carefully planning something a little different for next year. In summer we shall be visiting (and taking a ride on) the Gloucestershire and Wiltshire Steam Railway and then driving to nearby Stanway House, where we will have access to the beautiful Jacobean manor house with its remarkable fountain and gardens. The price of £36 includes all transport and entrance fees but not meals and refreshments (which will be available separately). An ideal Christmas gift for someone! Details to follow.
Online Map of Protected Trees Members often ask where they can find details of Tree Preservation Orders. We are delighted that the City Council’s Planning Department has now created a webpage dedicated to TPOs, including an excellent interactive database and map. You can find them here; www.leicester.gov.uk/planning-and-building/conservation/nature-and-biodiversity/protecting-trees
Subscriptions and Privacy Policy
The next Newsletter isn’t due until April so this is our last opportunity to ask you to set up a standing order on 1st April 2019 to pay your annual subscription. It’ll give you one less thing to remember AND fix the cost of your SCAS membership at £6 (from next year it will be £8 for annual payments). Please ask Nita, our Membership Secretary (Tel: 2448438 or email: [email protected]) to send you a form or download one from our website. As promised, our `Privacy Policy' now has its own page on the SCAS website from where it can be downloaded. All new members will receive a copy in their joining pack.
