Cedar Court

Cedar Court is a block of 12 flats built in 1912 to resemble a country house. It was designed by Taylor and Huggins for the Brent Garden Village Society, which was established in 1910 to provide co-operative housing on the model of Letchworth Garden City.

The building is constructed of pinkish-purple brick in Flemish bond with red brick bands and flat arches to the windows. The entrances and the window above each are finished with ashlar architraves. The rear is of stock brick. The roof is a hipped mansard with tiles, corniced brick stacks, hipped dormers and a projecting modillion eaves cornice with a central segmental pediment. Timber balconies are a notable feature.

The plan is L-shaped with 2 matching wings. Each wing has a symmetrical design of 5 bays. The outer bays project and contain 2-storey canted bay windows, while the central entrance bays also project. The central entrances have moulded stone doorcases with console-bracketed hoods, part-glazed doors with leaded coloured glass and leaded overlights. Above each entrance is a 2-light casement window with stained glass and a keyed hood mould containing a datestone marked 1912.

The building is 2 storeys with an attic. Ground and first floor windows are 12-pane sashes, while attic windows are small-pane casements. Small-pane French windows open onto decorative balconies from recessed bays on the first floor and outer bays of the attic. The rainwater pipes have decorative hoppers. The two wings are linked by a 3-bay return on the north-west side. The rear elevation comprises 3 storeys, with each wing featuring a recessed central bay containing a replacement balcony and entrances to 2 flats (dating from 1968). Gauged brick flat arches span the recessed, horned sashes at the rear.

The interior retains many contemporary features including decorative iron balustrades to concrete stairs and terrazzo hall floors. The entrance doors have part-glazed panels with leaded coloured glass and leaded overlights. Within the flats are panelled doors, ceiling mouldings, fitted kitchen dressers and cupboards, and carved timber chimneypieces with cast-iron grates featuring decoratively tiled cheeks.

The flats were built on part of the site of one of the sunken kitchen gardens belonging to Brent Lodge, an early 19th-century house that was subsequently demolished. The rendered brick retaining wall and raised terrace abutting the north wing form part of the listed structure.

Cedar Court was one of the few buildings erected by the Brent Garden Village Society. The Society's promoter, Alice Melvin, had previously worked at Letchworth and in 1910 published an ambitious plan for redeveloping the 26-acre Brent Lodge estate. The early 19th-century house was intended to be retained to provide community facilities and a central dining hall, but little of this plan was realised. Mrs Melvin withdrew from the Society in 1911. Cedar Court, built the following year, embodies her ideals through the inclusion of pantry and sculleries rather than full kitchens, designed to encourage communal use of the dining room in Brent Lodge. After the First World War, much of the remaining land was sold to developers, and Cedar Court's management was reorganised as a private company owned by the residents. Brent Lodge was bequeathed to Finchley Urban District Council and demolished in 1962. Cedar Court survives virtually intact and is comparable with contemporary co-operative flats at Homesgarth, Letchworth (1911) and Waterlow Court, Hampstead Garden Suburb (1909–10).