Redcliff, With Walls, Piers And Garden Structures

Redcliff, with walls, piers and garden structures

Italianate house, now divided into two houses (Nos. 9 and 11), located on the north side of Lower Park Road in Chester. The building was constructed in 1852 and extended, probably in the 1860s, with associated garden structures designed by Edward Kemp in 1852. The house is constructed of stucco with a grey slate roof, complemented by red sandstone garden features.

The exterior comprises two storeys plus cellar for No. 9, and two storeys plus attic for No. 11 (the 1860s extension), arranged in three bays to the front. The symmetrical west front features two stone steps leading to an Ionic portico with paired columns, an entablature with modillion cornice and balustrade, and a four-panel door with a one-pane fanlight in a round arch. On either side are full-height casements with two four-pane lights in eared architraves, flanked by Corinthian corner pilasters. Short recessed wings project from the corners; the left is blank while the right has an oriel window on a moulded corbel with a shaped copper roof. The first floor contains a frieze between two stringcourses with panelling beneath the windows, Doric corner pilasters, triple round-arched pilastered three-pane casements above the portico, and casements of two three-pane lights in eared architraves to each side. An eaves cornice and stuccoed chimneys complete this elevation.

The right side facing the road mirrors the front detailing, with a tripartite four-eight-four pane full-height casement in an eared architrave to the ground floor and a casement of two three-pane lights to the first floor. A short recessed bay to the rear contains a niche at ground floor level and a pair of round-arched two-pane sashes to the first floor. The rear wing forming No. 11 features a projecting timber-framed porch with four-pane and two-pane casements, while the first floor has four four-pane casements. The attic, set within a mansard roof, contains four gabled dormers with two-pane sashes in pediment cases. The left face overlooking the River Dee repeats the front detailing, and the rear bay contains a nineteenth-century conservatory-porch with a solid apsidal end featuring three round-arched fixed lights, a glazed roof with semi-dome to the end, and an iron column of intersecting spiral bars. No. 11 includes a large first-floor balcony with balustrade, its fenestration matching that of the front elevation. The first floor of No. 11 also has a large balcony with balustrade.

The interior remains largely intact and preserves several significant features: a purpose-designed Minton tile floor to the hall; doors with four bolection panels, and one with six panels to the cellars, which feature brick barrel-vaulting and wine-bins; panelled embrasures and dados; a well-preserved staircase; plaster wall-panelling and ceiling in the front left room; a good right front room with restored decoration; and cast-iron features throughout.

The garden retains the plan and principal features as originally designed by Edward Kemp and illustrated in the third edition (1858) of his "How to Lay Out a Garden", with the greenhouse being the only significant omission. The garden layout descends in terraces from the house level: stone steps lead from the house to an upper terrace; a semicircular stone-walled viewing platform sits at house level to the east; separate flights of fourteen and twenty-four steps descend to the middle terrace, with the western flight featuring winders through two ninety-degree turns and the eastern flight encircling the viewing platform; a flight of twenty stone steps passes through a rockery between the middle and lower terraces. The bedrock cliff to the west of the lower garden retains evidence of a Gothic arch, and further garden structures include a kerb to a small circular pool, the foundations of a formerly heated wall along the north boundary, and greenhouse foundations.

The combination of the high quality of the exterior and interior finishes with their integral relationship to the contemporary garden makes this property probably the most complete example of a nineteenth-century suburban house surviving in Chester.