THERE are retrospective plans to legalise work done to a historic stone wall after its collapse led to the temporary closure of “one of the prettiest streets in England”.

Metin Dener is seeking retrospective permission for the works done to the rebuilt section of a drystone retaining wall at Rosemary Cottage in Awkward Hill, Bibury.

Arlington Row residents were cut off after the wall was declared unsafe and emergency works were carried out to reopen vehicular access to their homes during the winter of 2023 and 2024.

While the works are now complete and the road has since been reopened, the latest listed building consent application submitted to Cotswold District Council seeks approval for correction to some of the section detail.

Consultants working on the scheme say the works should be approved as consistent for what was once a boundary field wall in this location and that they are “like for like” capping replacements.

They say the “flat” cappings in places adjacent were introduced only recently and should not be taken as precedence for the works.

“The original drawings submitted showed the capping to the retaining wall as a shallow fall “flat” stone capping,” the planning documents read.

“This was taken as copying a section of the wall which was exposed, the existing wall though had a mix of flat stones, collapsed and missing sections of capping and some vertical ‘cock and hen’ capping stones which are just visible of the site photos of the wall prior to September 2023 under the foliage.

“The contractor noted this during the demolition of the failing wall and re-built the wall capping in cock and hen capping on a ‘like for like’ basis rather than with the flat capping found adjacent on the recently re-built section.

“This type of capping is found on the set back section of wall further along the lane which the Conservation has noted as being acceptable for a field wall, when the whole of the wall was part of the same field wall previously.”

Rosemary Cottage is one of a group of cottages on Awkward Hill, just past the world famous Arlington Row. Arlington Row was built in the late 14th century as a wool store and converted into weavers houses in the late 17th century.

And is a nationally notable architectural conservation area depicted on the inside cover of UK passports. It is an extremely popular visitor attraction, probably one of the most photographed Cotswold scenes.

The cottages were built in 1380 as a monastic wool store. This was converted into a row of cottages for weavers in the late 17th century, with some late 17th or early 18th-century additions. The cloth produced there was hung out on racks to dry on The Rack Isle opposite, before being sent on to Arlington Mill for degreasing.

It was preserved by the Royal Society of Arts in 1929 and restored by the National Trust in the 1970s.

As a consequence of Arlington Row those properties nearby and further along Awkward Hill are of particular significance to the setting of the area as viewed from the publicly accessible and high tourist footfall routes.