18-30, WINDMILL GREEN

A terrace of thirty houses, numbered 18-30, forming a composition around a green with neighbouring properties at Nos 1-9, 10-17, and 12-20 Thwaite Road. These houses were built between 1947 and 1949 by the former Loddon Rural District Council, designed by Tayler and Green. They are two storeys high and constructed of colourwashed 'wire cut' bricks in varied colours, above a black tarred plinth, with an orange pantile roof and red 'wirecut' chimney stacks featuring pitched concrete copings and red clay pots.

The houses have wide frontages, measuring 30-33 feet (9-10 metres), and offer three bedrooms, with single or dual aspect depending on the orientation. They incorporate recessed porches and stores, creating a passageway from front to back without passing through living areas, a design choice made by the architects to resolve the issues associated with the traditional 'tunnel' backs common in terraces. Originally fitted with standard steel casement windows, some have been replaced with UPVC, although the original Saul-division modules have been retained. Each house frontage is defined by projecting cover panels over the cavity party walls.

The frontages of Nos 18-30 feature three-light casements on the first floor, with wide central panes. At ground floor level, there is a full-length casement with a central transom to the left, a porch with glazed doors and side lights, including a deep central transom, and a flat canopy supported by slender steel columns. A low patterned steel infill panel with trelliswork is positioned to the right, running over the ground floor cloakroom window, alongside a boarded store door with a glazed panel. These simple designs, with their elegant proportions and attention to detail, distinguished the scheme from the start.

The informal layout of the housing blocks around a broad, tapering green, south of Thwaite Road, aimed to recreate the best elements of vernacular design, combined with the social purpose of post-war rural housing. A shared pedestrian/vehicular access to the garage court in the south-west corner was an original feature, requiring a deviation from Ministry housing standards. The scheme was included in the Ministry of Health Housing Manual of 1949 and received a Ministry of Health Housing Medal in 1950. The planning of the individual houses is considered particularly noteworthy; however, there are no outstanding internal features.