Detached and paired villas in pale gault brick, with stucco details and canted bays, line Oxford Gardens, Cambridge Gardens and Bassett Road, built between 1867 and 1890 on the St Quintin family’s old Notting Barns farm. London Carpet Cleaning has worked in Notting Barns, W10, since 2009. Cleaning starts from £36 a room, with the pile needing 6 to 7 hours to dry after we leave.
From Notting Barns farm to St Quintin villas
Notting Barns is the old farm and ward name for this slice of North Kensington west of Ladbroke Grove. The manor of Notting Barns Farm passed to William St Quintin in 1769, and a century later, from 1867, his family began leasing the land west of Ladbroke Grove for building. Ladbroke Grove station had opened in 1864, and the houses followed it. The villas on Bassett Road, Cambridge Gardens and the western half of Oxford Gardens are attributed to the architect Henry Currey, who worked for Colonel St Quintin; different builders put them up between 1867 and 1890, one of them, John Gimbrett, building 75 houses across four streets.
Each street has its own character. Oxford Gardens is almost entirely double-fronted detached houses, Cambridge Gardens has the most generously spaced semi-detached pairs, and Bassett Road mixes the two, with the most elaborate fronts, stucco quoins and projecting Doric porches among them. Further east, nearer Ladbroke Grove, building started with three and four-storey stock-brick terraces from the 1860s, some of them by the developer Charles Henry Blake. Later came red-brick Edwardian houses (1905 to 1914) and the council’s Hill Farm Road cottage estate (1919 to 1926). Most of it lies in the Oxford Gardens and St Quintin conservation area, designated on 30 April 1975 and extended in 2002.
The census for Oxford Gardens and around
| Homes that are | Share |
|---|---|
| Flats in converted houses | 37.7% |
| Flats in purpose-built blocks | 41.6% |
| Terraced houses | 14.1% |
| Rented from the council or a housing association | 45.5% |
| Four or more bedrooms | 14.5% |
| Built before 1900 | 57.0% |
The census area that holds Oxford Gardens, Cambridge Gardens and Bassett Road is the one the ONS calls North Kensington. It is old housing: 57.0% of homes were built before 1900 and 68.1% before 1919. The big houses have mostly been divided. Flats in converted houses make up 37.7% of homes, so many front doors open onto a hall and a staircase shared by several flats, while 14.5% of homes are still large enough to have four or more bedrooms.
Ownership is mixed. Social renting, from the council or a housing association, accounts for 45.5% of households, and purpose-built blocks hold 41.6% of homes. For one of the whole houses, three bedrooms, the living room and one flight of stairs, the bill is £192; a two-bedroom flat in a converted villa, sitting room included, is £115. Only 2.4% of homes have no central heating, so the drying is rarely a worry above ground level.
Figures: ONS Census 2021 (Kensington and Chelsea 003) and VOA council tax stock, March 2024.
Pay-by-phone streets and front gardens
Kensington and Chelsea has no uncontrolled streets and does not issue visitor vouchers, so during controlled hours a visitor’s van goes in a pay-by-phone bay or a public car park. We use a bay a little way down Oxford Gardens or Bassett Road and run our long hoses from it, which reaches a top-floor flat in a split villa. The bays are free on Sundays and bank holidays, which makes a Sunday booking the easiest of the week.
The front gardens here are medium-sized, set behind low stock-brick walls that lost their railings in the Second World War. That means a path to cross with the kit, so please leave the path and the hall clear. In a converted villa, tell us which floor you live on and whether the hall and stairs are communal. If you are in a garden-level flat, let us know too, because those rooms need more drying time.
Felt tip, muddy prints and damp basements
The jobs split fairly cleanly. In the family houses off Oxford Gardens and Cambridge Gardens it is wool stair carpet that has taken felt tip and muddy prints from the children, a lounge carpet gone grey down the middle, and the odd coffee or curry spill on a fabric sofa. In the converted flats it is more often end-of-tenancy work, where the carpet has to come up well enough to satisfy a landlord and release the deposit. Front-room rugs in these tall houses are cleaned in place too, which suits them after a pet accident.
Many of the original villas have suspended timber floors under the carpet, and a few of the garden-level and basement flats hold damp. On a cold, still day a deep wool clean in one of those lower rooms can need longer than the usual 6 to 7 hours to dry, so we will ask you to leave a window open and never promise bone dry the moment we leave. We lift staining and odour as far as the fibre allows, though a carpet soaked through again and again may not return to new.
How much does carpet cleaning cost in Notting Barns?
Prices are agreed before we arrive, with no call-out fee, and a W10 villa is charged by the room on the same list we use across Kensington and Chelsea.
- Carpet cleaning, per bedroom, from £36
- Living room carpet from £43
- Through-lounge from £61
- Stairs, one flight, from £41
- Two-seater sofa from £57
- Rug up to 3m² from £35
Get a free quote, or call us on 020 8077 8090.
Cleaning for the villas and the flats inside them
For the lounges, bedrooms and stairs we use hot-water extraction, a method most people know as steam carpet cleaning, which rinses the wool deep and pulls most of the moisture straight back out. Fabric sofas, armchairs and headboards come under our upholstery cleaning, done by hand on the spot. Larger or more delicate pieces go through our rug cleaning service, cleaned in the house, with a photo sent first for anything delicate. If you need the same team for a property elsewhere in the borough, we cover the rest of Kensington and Chelsea on the same fixed prices.
W10 questions we get asked
Which Notting Barns streets do you cover, from Bassett Road to St Marks Road?
The whole of W10 here, including Oxford Gardens, Cambridge Gardens, Bassett Road, St Marks Road and Telford Road, and the stretch of W11 down towards Lancaster Road and Ladbroke Grove station. The St Quintin streets up towards Latimer Road are well within our patch, and so are neighbouring areas such as Shepherd’s Bush.
Is parking a problem for the van on these streets?
Not if we plan it. The borough has no uncontrolled streets and no visitor vouchers, so during controlled hours we pay at a pay-by-phone bay. Our vans carry long hoses, so we can park a little way down Oxford Gardens or Bassett Road and still reach a top-floor flat. Tell us if access is tight and we will plan the slot round it.
Can you clean wool carpet in a period house without shrinking it?
Yes. The villas here often have good wool or wool-mix carpet on the stairs and in the main rooms, and wool needs care. We control the water and heat, work in sections and finish with a thorough extraction, so the pile is left damp, never wet. That protects the fibre and keeps drying to the usual 6 to 7 hours in a normal room.
How long will the carpet take to dry in a Notting Barns villa?
Most carpets here are dry within 6 to 7 hours, helped along if you open a window or leave the heating on low. Heavier wool, a through-lounge or a garden-level room in one of the split villas can take longer on a damp day. We never over-wet a carpet, because soaking it only slows the drying and risks the backing.
I rent from a housing association. Is the carpet clean mine to book?
Yes. Nearly half the homes round here are social lets, and the carpet inside your flat is usually yours to arrange, so you book us at the same fixed prices as anyone else. The shared hall and stairs in a converted villa are usually a job for the landlord, and if you are leaving the flat, the dated receipt goes with your check-out papers.
Should my double reception room be booked as a through-lounge?
If the front and back rooms are joined into one space with one carpet, yes: that is a through-lounge, from £61. If they are still two rooms with a door or a different carpet in each, book them separately. If you are not sure, describe the room on the phone and we will price it with you.
Every Notting Barns clean carries our re-clean guarantee, so a stain that resurfaces gets a free return visit. Our cleaners are DBS-checked and insured, they cover their shoes and tidy up before leaving, and we have cleaned across North Kensington since 2009.
