Listed Building record MDR15726 - Nos. 79 and 81, Cavendish Road, Matlock Town

No. 81 Cavendish Road is one half of a semi. Both houses were identical in plan except for the position of the entrance. At 81 it is reached through the conservatory. This is an original Parker and Unwin design. The entrance hall would have lead straight into the one open plan living room. A partition has been built here with a door re-used from another part of the house. The theory was that small houses should not be scaled down versions of larger houses. Parker and Unwin wanted to reach back to the Middle Ages when hall living was experienced by all classes of people. Naturally Parker and Unwin looked to the vernacular of farm houses, note the framing of the door leaves and their metal latches. The Inglenook is a common feature of their work. It was provided for winter warmth. The Inglenook here backs onto the conservatory and two windows are punched through giving an intriguing view. Parker and Unwin pioneered the concept of fitted furniture, a lot of it, very simple and unpretending, survives here. (1) A grade II listed pair of cottages dating to 1903-4 and designed by Parker and Unwin. It is built of coursed rubble with ashlar dressings. It has plain tile roofs with two gable and one ridge ashlar stacks. It has a two-storey four-bay garden front with a pair of three-light flush mullion windows in the centre, flanked by two-storey five-light canted ashlar bay windows with flush mullions and transoms. Above in the centre is a pair of flush ashlar cross mullion windows. The interiors retain many of their original fittings including doors, inglenook fireplace on the ground floor and copper hooded fireplaces above. (2)