JERICHO ECHO ARTICLE

Spare a thought for Victorian Goths

Windows on the past

February 1998

Jericho has a character all its own. From an 18th-Century iron foundry to a 20th-Century publishing company - what other district can match us for diversity? The Victorians who built Jericho's two-up, two-down houses were heavily into Gothic; indeed the builders of several groups of houses must have shared a pattern book called Gothick Windows for Artisan Cottages - any passing Goth would approve. Hence delightful pointed arches to the front windows, sometimes separated by elegant lengths of iron scaffold pole (a building material well known to the Goths).

The snag with the original sash windows is that 100 years later they don't work very well. They certainly let in the light but they also let in the cold air, so gradually we are all replacing them. And in some cases this has involved removing the arches. A formal conservation scheme would be one answer, but unlikely to appear in the near future. So in the meantime, if anyone is planning to install double glazing could they also spare a thought for those Victorian Goths?

Author: Liza Picard, Cranham Street

---