Elizabeth Gaskell's House

84 Plymouth Grove was designed in the Regency style, probably by architect Richard Lane, , and was speculatively built as part of a wider development catering to the burgeoning middle-classes in the area, then on the outskirts of the city. The villa comprised drawing and dining rooms, seven bedrooms and a coach house wing. The lavish house was built in response to the newly emerging middle class citizens of Manchester. The city, which had rapidly expanded due to the Industrial Revolution, held various degrees of housing, ranging from, poverty-ridden slum housing to the new era of luxurious housing such as 84 Plymouth Road. The design is striking; the house contains 20 rooms on two floors…

, in portrait of 1851 by George Richmond]]Elizabeth and William, along with their children, Marianne, Margaret Emily "Meta", Florence, and Julia, moved into the house (then numbered 42 Plymouth Grove) in June 1850, after the publication of Elizabeth's first novel, Mary Barton. However, they had lived in Manchester for some time previously, as William Gaskell's job of assistant Minister at Cross Street Unitarian Chapel required the family to move from Knutsford, in neighbouring Cheshire. The family had stayed at two different locations in Manchester, both of which have now been demolished. Despite Elizabeth's concerns, the Gaskells were not frugal, with the 20 room house costing half of…