Bedford and Essex Almshouses is a Grade II listed building in the Watford local planning authority area, England. First listed on 26 August 1952. Almshouse.
Bedford and Essex Almshouses
- WRENN ID
- calm-brick-wren
- Grade
- II
- Local Planning Authority
- Watford
- Constituency
- Watford MP: Matt Turmaine (Lab)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 26 August 1952
- Type
- Almshouse
- Address
- Bedford and Essex Almshouses, 1-8, Church Street
- OS grid reference
- TQ 110 962
- Coordinates
- 51.654, -0.39658
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
The Bedford and Essex Almshouses, originally known as The Lord Essex Almshouses, are a row of eight almshouse cottages built in 1580. They are rendered and feature one storey with an attic, topped by plain tile roofs that have four massive paired brick chimney stacks. The front of the building is regular, showcasing three large gables and two smaller gables at each end, with overhanging eaves. The windows are wood mullioned, consisting of four lights in the large gables and two lights in the end gables and on the ground floor. The door openings are simply moulded and paired in the central three sections. Inside, the roof structure includes queen strut roof trusses with straight bracing. These almshouses were constructed by Francis, the 2nd Earl of Bedford, to provide housing for eight poor women from Watford, Chenies, and Langley.
Local climate
Bedford and Essex Almshouses 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 86% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is lower than that of 85% 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
- No sale records on file
- No related consent applications matched
- 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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