Cavendish House

Cavendish House is a mid-19th century villa, possibly designed by Sir Joseph Paxton, originally used as a boarding house and now a house. It is constructed of coursed millstone grit with ashlar dressings and has a Welsh slate hipped roof with stone stacks.

The exterior features a chamfered plinth, ground and first-floor bands, a first-floor panelled impost band, and deeply overhanging eaves supported by carved wooden brackets. The symmetrical front façade has a three-window arrangement, with a central round-headed doorway recessed within a moulded ashlar surround, topped with a keystone inscribed "Cavendish House." A four-panel part-glazed door and fanlight are within the doorway. Flanking the doorway are single canted stone bay windows, each with a hipped leaded roof. The central two-over-two sash windows in each bay are round-headed and taller than the fixed sidelights, which are topped with ashlar panels. Above are three round-headed two-over-two sash windows with flush surrounds and keystones. The side elevations have two round-headed two-over-two sash windows.

The interior has not been inspected. Cavendish House is located on Broad Walk, which is a group of Victorian villas and a walk overlooking the Pavilion Gardens originally laid out by Paxton around 1850. While most of the surrounding houses were built by speculative developers, some are reputed to have been designed by Paxton’s pupil, Edward Milner, from 1871, and built by Saunders & Woolcott of London for the 7th Duke.