48 AND 50, LARK HILL

WORCESTER

SO85SE LARK HILL 620-1/4/384 Nos.48 AND 50 22/05/54 Formerly Listed as: LARKHILL ROAD No.48) Formerly Listed as: LARKHILL ROAD No.50)

GV II

Pair of semi-detached villas. c1819-24 with later additions and alterations. Stucco over brick with hipped slate roof and stuccoed party-wall stacks. Symmetrical, Classical design; main facade to garden (west) facade. 3 storeys, 4 first-floor windows, with side ranges set back each with 1 first-floor window and rear service ranges, now garage and annexe. Stucco detailing includes horizontal rustication to ground floor drawn into voussoirs over wide, segmental-arched window recesses; cyma-moulded cornice over ground floor surmounted by Doric pilasters to ends and pairs of Doric pilasters between windows; entablature and blocking course. First floor has 6/6 sashes with blind boxes; second floor has 3/3 sashes; ground floor has 6/6 sashes; all in plain reveals. To right a timber verandah. Ranges set back to sides have similar fenestration. Renewed entrances to rear. To right return a 2-storey bow window with tripartite 6/6 between 2/2 sashes, curved on section. INTERIOR: No.48 has original plasterwork and joinery including dogleg staircase with carved tread ends, stick balusters and wreathed handrail; panelled shutters to some windows; acanthus frieze to ground-floor cornices; some Victorian fireplaces. HISTORIC NOTE: the Lark Hill development, 1819-24, was originally intended to have been more extensive with terraces and a crescent. Nos 38-50 (even) and Woodside, Lark Hill Road (qqv) form a good group of Victorian villas. No.48 was formerly listed as No.6 and No.50 was formerly listed as No.7 Lark Hill Road. (Worcestershire Historical Society Occasional Papers: Whitehead D: Urban Renewal and Suburban Growth: The Shaping of Georgian Worcs: 1989-: 44).