20, Reading Street

No. 20 Reading Street is a house in a terrace built in 1862 for the Great Western Railway Company. It is constructed of ashlar limestone set in black mortar and features a slate roof with brick gable stacks. The house is two stories high and consists of one bay with a through side passage and is two rooms deep. There is a 20th-century rear addition. The property has chamfered door and window surrounds, a fifteen-pane door, four-pane sash windows, and a two-pane sash window above the door.

This house is part of a village designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel to accommodate workers for the new Great Western Railway works. The village layout, which began construction in 1842, includes a grid of twelve terraces in six blocks on either side of the High Street, with most buildings completed by 1855. The village is recognized as one of Britain’s best-preserved and architecturally ambitious railway settlements.