Pickwick – Conservation Area Appraisal Produced by Pickwick Association 1 Plans used in this document are based upon Ordnance Survey mapping with the permission of the controller of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office © Crown copyright. Un- authorised reproduction infringes crown copyright and may lead to prosecution or civil proceedings. Corsham Town Council Licence number 100051233 2015 Contains British Geological Survey materials © UKRI [2011] As well as from the authors, images (maps, plans, photos., postcards, aerial views etc.) were sourced from Julian Carosi, Stephen Flavin, Larry St. Croix, Thomas Brakspear and David Rum- ble, to whom we are grateful: if there are any omissions we apologise sincerely. Our thanks also to Cath Maloney (for her editing skills), to Tom Brakspear and Paul Kefford who contributed additional text, and Anne Lock and Melanie Pomeroy-Kellinger who read and helpfully advised. Front Cover picture - The Roundhouse, Pickwick. Back Cover picture - The Hare and Hounds circa 1890 Draft for consultation January 2021 2 Pickwick Conservation Area Appraisal Contents Pickwick – Conservation Area Appraisal : Title Page 1 Copyright acknowledgements 2 Contents 3 Introduction by Thomas Brakspear 4 The Pickwick Association and the Pickwick Conservation Area Appraisal 10 Executive Summary 11 Part 1 – Background to this Review 12 Background 12 The Review 12 Planning Policy Context 14 Purpose and scope of this document 15 Corsham’s Neighbourhood Plan 16 Part 2 – Corsham - its setting and history 17 Geology 17 Location and Setting 18 Pickwick in Maps 20 Archaeology 21 Historic Development 22 Saxon and Norman; Medieval; post-Medieval 22 Modern 26 Part 3 – Pickwick – the Conservation Area in its context 32 Settlement Pattern – where people live 32 The Changing Face of Pickwick 33 The Conservation Area 35 The Conservation Area in relation to Corsham and the Corsham Conservation Area 36 Part 4 - Pickwick – its architecture, buildings and open spaces 37 Architectural and historic qualities of buildings 37 Overview 37 The architectural aspects of Pickwick buildings 38 Contribution made by non-designated heritage assets 40 Key views, vistas and panoramas 41 The Stone Walls 43 Land Use within the Conservation Area 45 Greenery and Planting 46 Arboricultural Report on the Beechfield Estate 47 The Beechfield Nature Area 48 Degree of loss of architectural and/or historic elements 49 Summary 50 Part 5 – the Conservation Area – What’s so special? 51 Key Features 51 Character Areas and their buildings 52 The focal area—Bath Road/A4 52 Pickwick Manor and its environs 54 The Hare and Hounds 55 Pickwick Manor 56 Beechfield 58 Conclusion 60 Appendix 1 - Management Plan 61 Suggestions as to the management of the Conservation Area 61 Potential for Development 61 Vulnerable buildings, buildings at risk, listed & unlisted buildings 62 New Buildings; Corsham Design Guide; Open Views; 62 Managed Open Space; Stone Walls 62 Preservation and enhancement strategy 63 Threats to Conservation Areas 64 Traffic management and street furniture 65 Hare and Hounds carpark 65 Appendix 2 - Notes About a selection of Pickwick Buildings 66 Appendix 3 - Extract from Heritage section of Corsham Neighbourhood Plan 72 3 Introduction: Thomas Brakspear What makes Pickwick special and provides a sense of place? How could this specialness be enhanced/retained in the future ? To the passing public the remarkable thing about Pickwick is houses rarely address the A4 directly but they, with their gar- the survival, almost unaltered, of what I will term Pickwick dens, provide an essential and characterful setting to Pickwick Street – that length of the A4 between the gate into the Hare Street. and Hounds at the west end and the gateway into Lancefield Place at the east (see map). This is the only part of the entire length of the A4 when one has the impression of passing through a traditional Cotswold village – one is not, of course, as there is no established church or proper manor house. Pickwick Street appears to have been built as a response to the increasing importance of the Turnpike road that ran through the centre of it. Development seems to have slowed between 1751 – 1803 when the Turnpike was moved north to pass through Middlewick. From 1803 until the arrival of the railway in Corsham in 1841, most of the development in Pick- wick seems to have been the building or alteration of larger houses around the outskirts – doubtless this was because easy access to Bath and London via a reliable, fast coach service was much valued by the increasingly numerous and prosper- ous middle classes. These larger houses have large gardens and the trees and screening plants in them provide a pleasant leafy environment at both ends of Pickwick Street. These 4 From 1840 until 1940 development more or less ceased as the steep pitch (NOT usually 45 degrees – 52 degrees is more typi- railway became the focal point in Corsham for development. cal) this material requires in order to keep the rain out. Stone Pickwick became an estate “village” – first acquired by the tiles would, with a little thatch, have been ubiquitous for roofs Poynders of Hartham Park and latterly by the Goldneys of all along the A4 Bath road from Calne to the centre of Bath Beechfield House. The Poynders (who adopted the 1751 – until about 1790 when Welsh Slate began to be imported 1803 Turnpike route as their coach drive) left their mark in along the Avon to Bath. Very little slate reached Corsham un- Pickwick with one or two new buildings and quite a few porch til the canal arrived at Lacock in 1810 where upon slate and additions to the old buildings. clay pan tiles flowed in, stifling the indigenous stone tile indus- try so that when the railway arrived it was, in the Corsham area, probably already dead. The imported materials were, in every sense, more practical – stone tiles are very heavy, la- bour intensive to dress and lay, snow can blow through them and they have to be laid at a steep pitch. But they were, in the 17th and 18th century, cheap because they could be dug out of the ground. Now they are expensive, but they do pro- vide a sense of place. Here it is interesting to note that one of the first families to demonstrate their appreciation of the character of stone tiles were the Poynders of Hartham Park. They had made their for- tune as London developers (and latterly as Pickwick quarry owners). In both Lower and Upper Pickwick (where they built their model farm) they went to the trouble of cladding both their new buildings and their alterations to old buildings with stone tiles so that they would harmonise with the buildings This house is thought to have been built by the Poynders to accommodate already there. This was in the second half of the nineteenth their Chaplain who took services at their (still standing) private chapel - century - a period when practically all new building and altera- Hartham Chapel. tions in Corsham were clad in clay or slate in spite of what one Poynder porch added to older house Interwar artificial stone tiling at Hudswell Since 1940 two factors have conspired to preserve Pickwick suspects must have been a glut of unwanted second-hand Street. The first is that the increasingly busy road has been a tiles (old photos reveal that Bath changed from a stone tile deterrent to development pressure – the noisy location is not clad city to a clay and slate clad city in this period). very desirable. The second is the introduction of Listed Build- Now stone tiles are so sought after and expensive that it is not ing legislation by Central Government – without that one can always reasonable to demand their use for new buildings. be fairly sure that the Local Authorities would have swept There are very good (and plenty of very bad) imitations which away the Hare and Hounds (just as they attempted to demol- are surely preferable to slate (which is, and usually looks, alien ish the listed Osborne House in Corsham because it was “in and foreign to Corsham) and to clay. Corsham actually pos- the way”). Instead, Pickwick has the characterful phenome- sesses a proud inheritance of pioneering and very good early non of articulated lorries swinging onto the wrong side of imitation stone tiles (in and around Hudswell) on buildings Pickwick Road as they wind their way to Leafield Trading Es- erected by the MoD between the wars. Like many successful tate from Pickwick Street via Pickwick Road to Valley Road. Of artificial materials, they are not well known because most on- such things a sense of place is made – rather than just an lookers are deceived by them. anonymous roundabout. Looking at Pickwick Street in detail, perhaps the most obvious characteristic is that practically every roof is stone tiled at the 5 Many officials (planners, conservation officers, architects) con- sider such deceit immoral and unsupportable – often they have been trained to think so. I think that is simplistic – many of the buildings people love play such tricks – see the artificial stone quoins on Corsham High Street. Slight eaves ‘bell cast‘ Above - Artificial stone quoins in Corsham The danger with imitation tiles is that if they are badly de- tailed or a poor imitation they can look very disappointing. Whether roofs are of real or imitation stone tiles traditional details should be adopted. So pitched valleys should be swept, not cut. Eaves and verges should project generously (200 and 150 mm respectively). The lowest courses of tiles should lie at a shal- lower pitch to achieve a slight bellcast. When old roofs are re- laid they are normally raised a couple of inches by modern battens and counter battens.