Legh Road, Knutsford, WA16

A handsome, sympathetically restored Grade II Listed Arts & Crafts house in the middle of the Legh Road Conservation Area, standing within extensive landscaped gardens of a little over 1.3 acres.  Constructed by Edmund Wragge, a notable civil and railway engineer of his time and the renowned architect Sir Percy Worthington. The property has many period features; multiple fireplaces, original leaded doors, stained glass detailing the zodiac, oak panelling and stripped wooden floors. It offers the next owner a unique opportunity to be the future Custodian of a truly special property.

Legh Road is the town’s foremost residential street, home to a mixture of beautiful period houses including the Italianate villas constructed by Richard Harding Watt in the late 20th Century.  Woodgarth is one of Knutsford’s most famous properties, a substantial and impressive period house right in the middle of the conservation area.  This Arts & Craft style has been copied many times since and it is wonderful today to see the original property sympathetically restored and modernised by the current owners, presented beautifully throughout.  The accommodation is large and impressive, boasting enough space for most family requirements at nearly 7000 square feet. 

An impressive original oak front door leads to a quarry tiled entrance lobby and a spacious reception hall beyond.  The hallway gives access to each of the ground floor reception rooms and there are two staircases leading from the hallway to several parts of the first floor.

The main drawing room is a huge split-level panelled room with windows to three sides and incorporating a wood burning stove. A glazed door leads to a rear terrace and an extensive fitted window seat sits below a large stone mullioned bay.  Other reception rooms include a ground floor study overlooking the rear garden, a spacious, second less formal sitting room with a matching stone mullioned bay and an open-hearth fireplace.  A large dining room doubles as a third sitting room, which has a dual aspect and an internal door linking into the informal kitchen/living/dining space. 

This area has been extended to create the multi-use area families seek today, with a frameless glass contemporary garden room. The kitchen has been recently fitted with a range of hand painted cabinets with natural stone worksurfaces and a Belfast sink.  There is a large central island and built-in appliances and a Rangemaster freestanding cooker.  A large wood burning stove is a feature of this room which opens into a dining space and into the glass garden room. A rear porch/boot room provides ample space and there are various small ancillary rooms including pantries on the ground floor, including a ground floor WC. 

At first floor level there are six bedrooms in all – the landing accessed from two staircases off the entrance hall.  The principal bedroom is a large space taking up one corner of the house and includes a spacious dual aspect bedroom with mullioned window, a large dressing room with a range of three-quarter height fitted wardrobes and a spacious en-suite bathroom with freestanding bath and an ornate hand painted cabinet with twin sinks.  At this end of the house there are two more bedrooms – one double and one single - currently used as a suite and served by a refurbished shower room.

The main guest bedroom sits at the far end of the house, again with a dual aspect and an en-suite bathroom and two further bedrooms are served by a shower room.  There is a useful first floor laundry room.

The house is accessed through remote entry gates from Legh Road onto an inner courtyard where there is garaging for three cars.  An arch runs past the kitchen to a lovely gravelled front forecourt which accesses the front door and there are ornate front lawns and topiary including a covered walkway which access the gardens beyond.  There are several good-sized terraces to the side and rear of the house and the main area of lawn drops away from the house to a lower level, is oval in shape and has some lovely garden structures including ornate borders and tree planting.  A number of mature trees sit around the edge of the site and there are 2 ponds.  There are large lower level garden cellars underneath the house on the same level as the lower garden.