31-33, Bedford Street

SP 9433-9533 8/95

WOBURN BEDFORD STREET (West side) Nos 31 to 33 (consecutive)

GV II Pair of Bedford Estate cottages, erected by the Seventh Duke of Bedford. Dated 1860. Light red mottled brick. C20 tiled roof.

Two storeyed row with two gables flanking a central gablet. Ground floor has three three-light windows, first floor has two two-light windows beneath left hand gable and one three-light window each beneath gablet and right hand gable. All are small-paned casements in timber mullioned surrounds, under gauged brick flat heads. Two doorways, one to left hand, and one to right hand of central section. Each has door of three vertical panels under gauged brick flat head with dripstone above. Two red brick multiple ridge stacks. 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 cottages are remarkable for the high quality of construction of humble dwellings at such an early date. They represent an influential contribution to the development of working class housing which culminated in garden cities and early council housing. The Dukes of Bedford constructed roughly 500 cottages in the locality between the late 1840s and World War I. This cottage group is similar to cottages in the Seventh Duke's Plans and Elevations, and is included for its group value.

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 Hartshorne: The System of building Labourers' cottages pursued on the Estates of His Grace the Duke of Bedford, nd. but apparently 1849.

Listing NGR: SP9482233357