(The whole terrace of six cottages (32 to 37) were Grade II listed in 1956)
(The whole terrace of six cottages (32 to 37) were Grade II listed in 1956)
No 32 has known an extraordinary sequences of uses since 1973, when it looked as if it was just another cottage. In the 1990s, it was a surgery for the local vet, then for a time it became an office for part of the Abbotsbury Software team before passing into the hands of a rival computer firm. In its latest form, it has become the office for an educational charity, though it was unoccupied at the time the right-hand photograph was taken in the spring of 2004.
Nos 33 and 34 are at least 300 years old, for they were rebuilt after a fire in 1704. They are described in the Appreciation as a pottery: a new kiln was installed in 1973 for the pottery opened in 1956 by Roger Ross-Turner (popularly known as "Gillie" after the wartime radio comedian Gillie Potter) and his son Jason, then a student at Camberwell and now living in America. The kiln had to be craned over the thatched roof, and the roof removed from the workshop. The pottery was later taken over by Roger Gilding, and the last of the pottery equipment was only removed in 2005.
Roger Ross-Turner senios died in the early 1960s, aged 78. By all accounts he was a character, driving everywhere in an A40 van; one of his works was a large cockerel made for the boardroom of Courage's brewery in the days when there were no less than 97 pubs in Weymouth.
The building is now home to Abbotsbury Pictures, a framing service and gallery. The photograph was taken during Dorset Art Week in 2004, when the gallery was liberally festooned with Art Week banners and posters.