Building record 11083 - Redcliff, Lower Park Road

Redcliff consists of a white stucco villa in the Italianate style built in the 1850s as part of the Queen’s Park suburb of Handbridge. The suburb was promoted by Enoch Gerrard, who also had the Queen’s Park Bridge built, in the 1850s to 1860s as a middle class residential suburb. The Lower Park Road area was aimed at the upper middle class with iconic detached villas set within large designed gardens. The development of Queen’s Park progressed only at a slow rate and by the 1870s only six properties had been built. It is now two houses. (2)

It was extended in the 1860s with garden structures added in 1852 by Edward Kemp. No.9 has 2 storeys plus cellar, No.11 which forms the 1860s extension has 2 storeys plus attic. 3 bays to front. Symmetrical west front: 2 stone steps to Ionic portico with paired columns. (1)

The garden retains the plan and features, other than greenhouse, as designed by Edward Kemp and illustrated in his "How to Lay Out a Garden", 3rd Edition 1858. Stone steps down from house-level to upper terrace; semicircular stone-walled viewing platform at house level, east; separate flights of 14 and 24 steps, west and east, to middle terrace, the west steps having winders through two 90 degree turns and the east steps encircling the viewing platform; flight of 20 stone steps through rockery between middle and lower terraces; bedrock cliff west of lower garden, with evidence of Gothick arch; kerb to small circular pool; formerly heated wall along north boundary of garden; greenhouse foundations. (1)

<1> English Heritage, 2005, List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest, 469855 (Digital Archive). SCH4666.

<2> Lewis C.P & Thacker A.T. (eds), 2003, Victoria County History - A History of the County of Chester: Volume Vi, The City of Chester - General History and Topography (Book). SCH6521.