Diamond Cottage is a rustic cottage designed by
John Nash (1752–1835) and
George Stanley Repton (died 1858) in
Blaise Hamlet
Blaise Hamlet is a group of nine small cottages around a green in Henbury, now a district in the north of Bristol, England. All the cottages, and the sundial on the green, are Grade I listed buildings. Along with Blaise Castle, the hamlet is l ...
, Bristol, England.
The picturesque cottage is one of a group of ten built around 1810 as retirement homes for the servants of a wealthy banker.
Location
The land on which the cottage stands is part of an estate purchased by
John Scandrett Harford
John Scandrett Harford, FRS (8 October 1785 – 16 April 1866) was a British banker, benefactor and abolitionist.
Early life and background
Harford was the son of John Scandrett Harford, a prominent banker in Bristol. By the end of the 18th c ...
, a banker, for £13,000 in 1789.
Harford had a substantial house built and asked the landscape architect
Humphry Repton
Humphry Repton (21 April 1752 – 24 March 1818) was the last great designer of the classic phase of the English landscape garden, often regarded as the successor to Capability Brown. His style is thought of as the precursor of the more intric ...
to lay out the grounds.
Repton became a partner of John Nash, whom Harford commissioned to design a group of cottages as homes for his retired servants.
Nash created sketches of the cottages, which George Repton built.
The cottages surround an open green.
Each cottage faces the green and has a separate back garden.
They were described by Pevsner as "...the nec plus ultra of picturesque layout and design".
When built, the cottages would have been set in open country.
Since then the group of cottages has been surrounded by a high wall, which hides the modern housing around them.
The hamlet became a National Trust property in 1943.
Diamond Cottage was made a
listed building
In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...
, grade I: buildings of exceptional interest, on 8 January 1959.
It is listed as 901-1/20/1341, no. 2 Blaise Hamlet, Diamond Cottage on Hallen Road.
The exterior has been carefully restored, while the interior has been modernised and is still occupied.
The cottage is rented by the National Trust.
Description
The picturesque style Diamond Cottage was built in 1812.
It is faced with random rubble.
The hipped roof is tiled in stone, and has two diagonally-set brick chimney stacks to the rear.
On two sides there is a pent roof over a deep coved eave, with a leaded lattice casement in each wall.
The cottage is entered from the left through a plank door in a porch with a pitched roof.
Before renovation it had a kitchen, sitting room, scullery and outside lavatory.
The attic with a half dormer is reached by a
dogleg stairway.
The cottage interior was modernised around 1975.
Notes
Sources
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Grade I listed buildings in Bristol
Houses in Bristol