Fryerning Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Plan Cover illustration: The road junction and oak tree at Church Green. This document was produced by Essex County Council for Brentwood Borough Council. The appraisal was prepared by David Andrews, with assistance from Libby Kirkby- Taylor and other members of Essex County Council’s Historic Buildings and Conservation Team. The modern maps in this document are reproduced by permission of the Ordnance Survey ® on behalf of the Controller of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office. © Crown Copyright. Licence number LA100019602. © Brentwood Borough Council and Essex County Council 2011. CONTENTS 1. Introduction 1 2. Planning policies 1 3. Heritage, conservation and other designations 2 4. Character statement 4 5. Origins and development 5 Location and landscape setting Historical development 6. Materials and detailing 9 7. Uses 11 8. Townscape and Spatial Analysis 12 Principal views Green space Public realm 9. Character Zones 14 10. Area Analysis 16 Character zone 1 Character zone 2 Character zone 3 11. Evaluation of Contribution to Character 29 12. Management Proposals 30 Problems and pressures Boundary changes Additional planning controls Locally listed buildings Building at risk Public realm Open space and hard and soft landscaping 13. Bibliography 36 Appendix – Statutory List Descriptions 37 This page is intentionally blank. 1. INTRODUCTION Brentwood Borough Council commissioned Essex County Council to prepare this Conservation Area Appraisal and Review in August 2011. The research and fieldwork were carried out in August and November 2011. Conservation Areas are ‘areas of special architectural or historic interest, the character or appearance of which it is desirable to preserve or enhance’ (Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990). They were introduced by the Civic Amenities Act of 1967. Local Authorities have a duty to designate Conservation Areas, to formulate policies for their preservation and enhancement, and to keep them under review. Designation of a Conservation Area extends planning controls over certain types of development, principally the demolition of unlisted buildings which requires Conservation Area Consent, and works to trees. Local Authorities will also formulate policies in their local plans or local development frameworks to preserve the character of their Conservation Areas. However, designation does not prevent any change within Conservation Areas and they will be subject to many different pressures, good and bad, that will affect their character and appearance. Government policy for conservation areas was newly set out in 2010 in Planning Policy Statement 5: Planning for the historic environment (PPS 5), supported by its Statement on the Historic Environment 2010, and the Historic Environment Planning Practice Guide. Conservation areas are treated as part of the wider historic environment, and are considered to be a ‘heritage asset’ like listed buildings and other parts of the historic environment which have some degree of statutory protection. PPS 5 states that ‘The Government’s overarching aim is that the historic environment and its heritage assets should be conserved and enjoyed for the quality of life they bring to this and future generations.’ The historic environment is valued not simply for its cultural importance, but also for its contribution to the quality of life, and its potential for facilitating regeneration and economic growth, and in adapting to a more sustainable life style. 2. PLANNING POLICIES The Brentwood Replacement Local Plan, adopted August 2005, contains the following statements under ‘Conservation and Protection of the Environment: Conservation Areas’. 9.52 Some parts of the Borough are of significant townscape value worthy of special protection. These areas are usually characterised by groups of buildings of particular architectural or historic interest, the spaces between them and their general setting and character. Designation of such areas as Conservation Areas provides additional statutory powers to control the demolition of buildings and prevent the loss of trees. The design of new development will be carefully controlled to protect and preserve the character of these areas. 9.53 A total of 13 Conservation Areas have been designated so far within the Borough. 9.54 The Council not only has greater power to control development within the Conservation Areas but also has a duty to devise schemes to preserve 1 and enhance the character and appearance of the area. The Council will, therefore, seek to carry out Conservation Area character appraisals, in accordance with PPG15, in order to clearly assess and define their character, allowing informed planning decisions and identification of what should be preserved and enhanced. 9.55 Within Conservation Areas it is necessary to carefully assess the design and materials of any new development proposals. This assessment plays an essential part in determining whether or not a scheme is acceptable in principle. Therefore, in order to ensure a high standard of design and materials, detailed schemes rather than outline applications will normally be required. Policies C14-17 relate to conservation areas and listed buildings. There are also tight restrictions on development in the Green Belt (policies GB1 – 8). 3. HERITAGE, CONSERVATION AREA AND OTHER DESIGNATIONS The Fryerning Conservation Area was first designated in March 1991. The Conservation Area boundary encloses the church and manor house at the southern end, narrows to little more than the width of the road, and then expands to enclose the triangle formed by Back Lane, Mill Green Road and Mill Lane and the house plots along them. The constriction where the boundary narrows effectively divides the Area into two distinct parts. The Conservation Area is in the Green Belt, and within a Special Landscape Area. Two public rights of way enter the churchyard from the road and head off west and south-west into the open countryside. Eleven buildings or structures are listed, one at grade I and two at grade II*. There are no scheduled monuments. There are 17 Tree Preservation Orders in the Conservation Area. However, trees within the Conservation Area enjoy protection inasmuch as anyone carrying out works to a tree in a conservation area must give written notification to the local planning authority at least six weeks beforehand. 2 Fig. 1: Heritage and other designations in the Conservation Area. 3 4. CHARACTER STATEMENT Fryerning is an attractive and essentially rural Conservation Area, anchored by the well kept church and churchyard at its southern one end, from which lanes lead to the north. Along these there are detached houses set on spacious plots. Trees, in particular large oaks, make a significant contribution to character of the Conservation Area, enhancing the seclusion of the individual houses and shading the lanes, giving the northern part of the Area the appearance of a settlement in a wood. Apart from one or two late medieval and Georgian buildings, most of the houses are 20th-century and in the Arts and Crafts style. The houses around Mill Green Road form a notable group of buildings in this style, unusual in Essex. Fig. 2: Aerial photograph of the Fryerning Conservation Area 4 5. ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT 5.1 Location and Landscape Setting Fryerning is a small village situated in central Essex, to the south of Chelmsford, and north-west of the line of the A12 road, only a mile from its larger sister village of Ingatestone on the main road. The A12 at this point follows the valley of the river Wid. Fryerning stands on higher ground above the valley, the sides of which are intersected by streams which flow down to the river. This makes for a gently hilly landscape which would have been attractive to early settlement. St. Mary’s church stands on quite a prominent hill at the southern end of the Conservation Area and village. To the north, the land rises up to higher ground over the Bagshot Beds, an area of poorer soils where, beyond the Conservation Area, there is the woodland of the Mill Green and Highwoods area which must always have been very extensive, as it still is today. Fig. 3: Detail from Chapman and André map of Essex, 1777, showing Fryerning 5.2 Historical Development The circular shape of Fryerning churchyard is characteristic of churches located on prehistoric sites. However, despite this and its hilltop location, no evidence for prehistoric activity has yet come to light here or elsewhere in the Conservation Area. The old A12 through Ingatestone is in origin the Roman road from London to Colchester, and has been a major thoroughfare ever since. No Roman remains have been discovered in the Conservation Area. To the north, there is the site of a Roman villa at Mill Green (HER 660), which is presumably the origin of the Roman brick reused in Fryerning church. 5 Fig.4: Fryerning as represented on the 1st edition Ordnance Survey map, 1876 Fryerning lies within the bounds of a former late Roman or early Saxon estate reconstructable by the shared feature of a place name in Ginges, the other villages that formed part of it being Ingatestone, Margaretting and Mountnessing. At the Norman conquest, the manor was given to Robert Gernon who held extensive lands in Essex. His grandson Gilbert de Mountfichet gave half the manor, including the church, to the Knights Hospitaller. The other half was added to the Hospitallers’ landholding probably by Gilbert’s son. It is the link to the Hospitallers which is 6 thought to have contributed the ‘friars’ element in the place name Fryerning, Fryer Inge being first recorded in the 16th century, the village having previously been known as Ging Hospital. Fryerning parish was originally a long narrow tract of land enclosed by Ingatestone on the north and south, extending from Blackmore in the west and reaching south- eastwards to include what is now part of Ingatestone on the main road, and even further east, beyond the railway line, to border on Margaretting and Buttsbury.