Upton Park's house-style

Walking around the Park a clearly evident house-style is the frequent use of high holly hedges bordering the frontage to the roadway. Early UPPA minutes comment on hedges being too high for the safety of traffic and pedestrians which suggests that they are a long-established feature of the Park. Hawthorn was also common and some of today's front hedges are a holly / hawthorn mix.

As for housing; the Park has developed for over a century and so like many small villages the housing is to customised designs and built to the style of the day. No property has been built in the style of yesterday although most house extensions have preserved the period of their original.

One of the first houses - Thomas Wood's (nos:9 & 13) does feature the gothic style doors of the early Victorian period and many of the Victorian houses still have their original robust front doors and sash windows. While no record of the Builders used for these Victorian houses has been identified; it is clear that some of them either used the same builder or at least followed similar styles and use of materials. Numbers 80, 56/58, 40/42 and others use similar window frames and brickwork. Around this 1870 period no hard engineering bricks seem to have been used but soft yellow bricks have provided ribboning in the front elevation brickwork. Interestingly no: 84 , built late-1850s, has imitated this style many years ago by painting on its yellow ribboning.

Further into the 1870s and the houses become grander in style and blue engineering bricks used at dampcourse level and for ribboning. Hard Ruabon red engineering bricks at least for the full house frontage were not used until the 1890s and early 1900s. One house - no:28 - not only uses these but features the WM brickwork patterning associated with Westminster property. The popular Chester city Victorian styling of mock-Tudor is used only once on the last vacant plot in the inner circle. Nos: 15/17 have their top half black & white timber framed.

Finally the chimney pots. While various styles are to be seen on the older properties; nevertheless one style is predominant - the square yellow. It is believed that in early days some Lady Boughtons were used but any that survived are now only garden features.



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