St Michael's Cottage, Upper Packington Road, Ashby-de-la-Zouch

Image: © Oliver Mills Taken: 5 Feb 2023

Despite initial impressions, this seems to be one of the oldest properties in this part of Ashby. Before the 20th Century, the Cottage was the only dwelling on or around Windmill Hill, aside from the Windmill of its namesake and a small quarry used for the various Robert Chaplin-designed developments around Ashby in the early 19th Century (i.e. Ivanhoe Baths/Terrace, Royal Hotel). In the early 20th Century it was joined alongside by the "Red House", a large Edwardian manor which survived until the end of the 1960s. This plot, to the North of the Cottage, was subsequently redeveloped into St Michael's Close; followed by the plots to the South from the mid-1970s onwards. The entirety of Windmill Hill is now developed with housing, yet St Michael's Cottage still survived, making for an unexpected sight when its deeply recessed roadside view (as per this photograph) came into view. Surprisingly, the cottage's comprehensive reconstruction and extension into a contemporary-styled house was approved without mention or acknowledgement of its history. This has unfortunately meant that any surviving historical characteristics of the cottage have been permanently lost.

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