Country Life Cottage Competition - Regional Cottages.

Following correspondence in Country Life on the subject of cottage design, and the importance of avoiding anything like a standard design being used all over the country, “Country Life” organised an important competition, the full particulars of which were published in its issue of the 10th January 1914. Eighteen landowners, all of them men associated with the attempt to improve housing conditions, have each agreed to build a pair of cottages in their respective counties in accordance with the design which will receive the prize of twenty-five guineas for each type. The eighteen successful competitors receive their fees in the ordinary wav from the landowner.

Cocker and Hill submitted two entries  - semi-detached cottages in the Somersetshire category and an entry in the Yorkshire North Riding category – for which they were awarded first and second place respectively. Details of their prize-winning design in the Somersetshire category appeared in “Construction,” a Canadian publication.

The first prize was given to Cocker and Hill 's design, in which they showed a pitched roof of Bridgewater double Roman tiles (a variety of pantiles), and the result is certainly very satisfactory. In order to keep the cost as low as possible Cocker and Hill put the third bedroom on the ground floor, with its door opening from the living-room. It is a matter for argument as to whether the entrance to it should not have been from the lobby, but it is to be borne in mind that this would prejudice the arrangement of the furniture, and especially of the bed. The scullery is very convenient in respect to the living-room, and the larder opens from the latter and has a north light. The staircase also rises from the living-room. The two bedrooms upstairs are well arranged. The cubic contents of the pair are 16,562 ft. (there is a clerical error in the printing of this figure on the plan schedule). It seems possible that with such a small amount of wall building these cottages could be built for 9 cents a cubic foot, which, with the addition of the W.C. and coal-cellar, means a total cost of $1,555. The elevations realize the cottage character. Many competitors seemed to think it necessary to provide all manner of trivial little architectural features which fill no essential need and involve extra cost. Cocker and Hill dealt in a straight-forward fashion with the problem set them. [Construction Canada 1914 page 293].

Although the West Riding cottages are known to have been built, the outbreak of the First World War probably impacted on the construction of other schemes, including Cocker and Hill’s design. Only in 1919 did Country Life publish the results of the competition in book form – Richard Fletcher

Reference    Country Life 10 January 1914 – competition announced
Reference    Country Life, 1914, vols 35-36, p45
Reference    Country Life 25 April 1914 – competition results
Reference    Country Life 3 July 1915 page 36 – West Riding Cottages completed
Reference    Construction (Canada 1914) page 293 – Somersetshire type cottage
Reference    Lawrence Weaver: The “Country Life” Book of Cottages, 2nd Edition 1919