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'Time capsule' house wins lottery grant

The house of David Parr, an 'artist-painter’ who worked for the Cambridge decorative arts firm F. R. Leach in the 1800s, has won a £625,300 Heritage Lottery grant to repair and restore it, and open it to the public.

The house, in the Mill Road area of Cambridge, was decorated and hand-painted by Parr, who was inspired by designer and poet William Morris. Parr lived there between 1886 and 1927.

After his death in 1927, his granddaughter Elsie came to live in the house aged 12 and stayed there for the next 85 years.

Her regard for her grandfather’s work and the survival of her family artefacts has created a 20th Century time-capsule that tells remarkable stories of how ordinary people lived in Cambridge.

David Parr House charity was set up in 2014 to preserve the house. The grant would help "make a future" for the house, the charity said.

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