52 and 54, Holywell Hill is a Grade II listed building in the St Albans local planning authority area, England. First listed on 27 August 1971. House. 10 related planning applications.

52 and 54, Holywell Hill

WRENN ID
sombre-crypt-peregrine
Grade
II
Local Planning Authority
St Albans
Constituency
St Albans MP: Daisy Cooper (LD)
Country
England
Date first listed
27 August 1971
Type
House
Address
52 and 54, Holywell Hill, AL1 1BX
OS grid reference
TL 146 069
Coordinates
51.7492, -0.34098
Source
Historic England listing

Also on this page: sale history · related consents · flood risk · radon risk · weather exposure · detailed attributes ↓

Description

This property is now a single house, dating to circa 1600 with a substantial front facade dating to about 1820. It has three storeys and an attic, displaying three windows, plus an additional window on the second floor positioned above a high carriageway that extends halfway up the first floor. A window located centrally on the second floor has been blocked. The roof is steeply pitched and tiled. The facade is plastered, with a moulded stone plinth and a moulded string course running along the first-floor cill level. The window above the carriageway is a two-light casement. The remaining first and second-floor windows are sash windows set within flush box frames, featuring Gothic glazing bars. There are two doors on the ground floor, centrally located; one is a six-panel door, and the other is modern. The window on the left-hand side is a 19th-century sash window with vertical glazing bars, while the window on the right-hand side is modern.

Inside, there are four rooms with panelling that dates to circa 1700. A panelled hall and staircase feature thick, twist balusters, and a panelled dado runs along the stairwell. The floors are of thick oak plank and a considerable number of exposed beams remain, including tie-beams and a long central beam in the attic. Close-studded timbering is exposed in two rooms and on the landing. One first-floor room contains a plaster ceiling decorated with a head of Caesar Augustus within medallions, set within geometric shapes with raised floral borders. A timber-framed rear extension is present. A memorial tablet commemorating the First World War, one of a series of plaques in St Albans marking the fallen of individual streets and localities, is set into a wall. The property forms part of a group with numbers 36 to 58 (even).

Local climate

52 and 54, Holywell Hill sits in a drier-than-average part of the UK, with an average of 710 mm of rain a year. This makes it drier than 89% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is lower than that of 87% of listed buildings.

It experiences an average of 31 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 61% of listed buildings. Of these, 15 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.

Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.

More on this building

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  • No EPC on record for this property
  • Sale history — 4 transactions since 1997
  • Related listed building consents — 10 applications
  • Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
  • Flood risk assessment
  • Radon risk assessment
  • Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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