4-34, Faringdon Road

This list entry was subject to a Minor Enhancement on 28/04/2020

SU 1484 NE 6/97

SWINDON FARINGDON ROAD (north side) Nos 4-34 (even Nos)

17.2.70

GV II In order to house the workforce for the new Great Western Railway works, IK Brunel designed a new village to the south of the railway line. Brunel’s early layout drawings of 1840 show a grid similar to the final plan of 12 terraces in six blocks on either side of the High Street (from 1893 Emlyn Square). Construction started in 1842, and by 1855 most of the buildings had been completed. Houses and cottages of different types were built, as well as lodging houses. Brunel himself designed only the first block of 1842 (4-25 Bristol Street); as it was visible from the railway line, this is in a more decorative style than the others.

The financial difficulties of the contractors JD & C Rigby, who undertook to build 300 cottages but only completed 130, delayed the completion of the village until the 1850s. The cottages to the west of Emlyn Square were built first (1842-1843), followed by those on the east side (1845-1847). The end blocks towards Emlyn Square, containing corner shops on the ground floor, were built in 1845-1847, and the remainder, mostly end blocks on the outer ends of the streets, were built in 1853-1855. In 1966, the local authority acquired the cottages from British Rail and restored them. The village is one of Britain’s best-preserved and architecturally most ambitious railway settlements.

Terrace of sixteen cottages, 1846-1847 for Great Western Railway Company. Coursed squared rubble. Ashlar door and window surrounds, coursed rubble rear walls. Slate roofs with brick stacks on party walls. Each dwelling two-storey one-bay with through side passage, two rooms deep. C20 brick lean-to to rear. Low chamfered plinth. C20 fifteen-pane glazed doors with chamfered surrounds and splayed stops. Four-pane sashes in chamfered surrounds. No 34 retains original glazing: twelve-pane sashes with margin lights and beaded plank door. This is now the 'Railway Village Museum' and is maintained as a typical railway- man's house of c.1900. Interior layout modified c.1890 by the replacement of the rear washhouse and WC with scullery and a new WC.

Listing NGR: SU1467284770