Storey's Way, Number 48

Although the original layout of the garden remains, it has been recently replanted. The path passes through a formal square contained by yew hedges and surrounded by flower beds, then into a relaxed wilder area filled with spring bulbs and flowering shrubs leading to the shade of a vinery. The functional requirements for growing vegetables and fruit for the family are then accommodated and the garden path ends in a symmetrically planted orchard.

The following is from the Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest. For the most up-to-date Register entry, please visit the The National Heritage List for England (NHLE):

www.historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list

Suburban Arts and Crafts garden laid out in 1913 to the designs of M. H. Baillie Scott.

LOCATION, AREA, BOUNDARIES, LANDFORM, SETTING

48 Storey's Way lies on the northern boundary of the West Cambridge suburb. The garden is situated on the south side of the L-shaped Storey's Way. It is on level ground and occupies an area of approximately half an acre. The long, narrow rectangular plot is aligned north-east, south-west and is approximately 23m in width and 91m in length. The house is set back from the road by approximately 14m, its long rectangular plan spanning the width of the garden plot. The garden is bounded on the short north-east side by a low white paling fence (not the original), and on the short south-west side by mature trees. The long north-west and south-east sides are bounded by a short section of brick wall against the garden rooms, followed by a fence of vertical planks against the pergolas. This fence continues to form the boundary along the south-east side, whilst the south-west side is bounded by mature trees.

ENTRANCES AND APPROACHES

The garden is approached from the north-east through the paling boundary fence which contains three gates.

PRINCIPAL BUILDING

The Grade II* listed 48 Storey's Way is an Arts and Crafts house of two and a half storeys and approximately five bays. It is constructed of brick covered in whitewashed roughcast render and has a dramatic sweeping roofscape which is clad in plain clay tiles of variegated hues. The windows are horizontal casements with leaded lights and the doors have studded panels and long iron strap hinges.

GARDEN

The garden forms a series of six outdoor ‘apartments', as Baillie Scott called them, which change in character. They are laid out on a system of cross axes which provide vistas along the length and width of the garden. The three main axes begin at the paling fence to the front garden which has three gates: the central one is aligned with the cross passage in the house through to the end of the garden; the axis on the right is aligned with the door to the service area which leads to the ‘garden room' (as it is called on the original plan) and pergola and thence to the end; and that on the left with the door to the bicycle store which leads through the study to the corresponding ‘garden room' and pergola. There are subtle changes in the level of the ‘apartments' through the use of two steps laid in brick stretchers; and most of the paths are edged in narrow brick.

The three main axes are marked in the front garden by two privet hedges, and the garden is further divided into four unequal grassed rectangles by stone paths edged in cobblestones and narrow brick. The central vertical path has borders of roses, peonies and lavender. There are four tall yew trees at the angles where the paths cross, and a pair of box balls on either side of the shorter horizontal paths which also have wooden gates.

In the main part of the garden, extending from the outer bays on the south-west garden front are two covered sections of the pergolas, or ‘garden rooms'. These have square section timber shafts on brick and stone bases with a brick floor laid in herringbone edged in stretchers. The garden rooms continue seamlessly into five-bay pergolas which have rough hewn poles and a brick floor laid in basketweave edged in cobblestones with two brick steps at the end flanked by low brick square piers. These have moulded stone square caps and a frieze with an elongated embattled pattern. The path on the north-west side continues along the length of the garden, and is laid in gravel and edged in narrow brick.

The two lawns located between the pergolas are bordered along their south-west side by rill-shaped brick plant boxes terminating on the inner edge in low square brick piers in the same style as those just described. The central path between the lawns is of gravel, as is the cross path at the end. The lawns are separated by a yew hedge from the former rose garden which is now lawned over but retains its square form. It has a wide grass path on the central axis and narrower brick paths with steps on the cross axis which meet in the middle. Each path is flanked by a pair of box balls and surrounded by flower borders.

A yew hedge separates the rose garden from the wild garden. This has a central grass path, either side of which are miniature spring meadows planted with anemone blande, narcissi, magnolia, lilac and wild geraniums. Further to the south-west, the next cross axis is formed by a nut walk of hazelnut trees, at the centre of which is a slightly sunken oval vinery with slender poles (which replaced the original rotten oak) resting on a brick plinth which has openings on each of the four sides.

The next ‘apartment' is the vegetable garden, the entrance to which is marked by two brick steps flanked by low brick piers, leading to a central gravel path edged in narrow brick and low box hedges. In the early C21 a grid has been laid out in the two beds using salvaged bricks. Two steps lead up to the orchard which is divided from the vegetable garden by a gravel path and flower bed, and the recent addition of espaliers. The orchard retains some of the original fruit trees, including apple trees.

Selected Sources

Books and journals

Baillie Scott, M H , House and Gardens, (1906)

Baillie Scott, M H, Beresford, A E, Houses and Gardens, (1933)

Bradley, Simon , Pevsner, Nikolaus , The Buildings of England: Cambridgeshire, (2014)

Diane Haigh, , Baillie Scott: The Artistic House, (1995)

Ian MacDonald-Smith, , The Houses and Gardens of M. H. Baillie Scott , (2010)

Rawle, T, Cambridge Architecture, (1993)

Wendy Hitchmough, , Arts and Crafts Gardens, (2005)

Guillebaud, Philomena, 'Proceedings of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society, XCVI, pp. 193-210' in West Cambridge 1870-1914: building the bicycle suburb, (2007)

Other

Cambridge City Council, Storey's Way Conservation Area Appraisal, April 2008,

Reasons for Designation

The garden of 48 Storey's Way, laid out in 1913 to the designs of M. H. Baillie Scott, is included on the Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

* Designer: it is by one of the most accomplished and prolific designers of the Arts and Crafts Movement whose work is well represented on the List;

* Design interest: it is a highly significant work that embodies Baillie Scott's fundamental ideas about garden design and a unified approach to planning. The design of the garden is carefully integrated with that of the house to create an open and dynamic relationship between the inside and outside space, and demonstrates the serious thought he gave to small, everyday gardens that involved a realistic amount of maintenance for their owners;

* Intactness: the layout has remained in almost its complete original state and retains nearly all the features seen in early photographs;

* Rarity: it is not only a rare and important survival of a suburban Arts and Crafts garden but is the only known example of a garden of this scale by Baillie Scott to have survived in anything like its original condition;

* Group value: the garden and house form an ensemble of exceptional importance as one of the best examples of Baillie Scott's seminal and influential work. The garden has considerable group value with the house which is listed at Grade II* and is part of an important cluster of five listed Baillie Scott houses in Storey's Way;

* Context: the garden forms part of an exceptional suburban development in West Cambridge which encompasses the work of some of the most notable architects of the day.