The below is an edited version of Historic England’s listing information on the houses at Water Lane, Histon. They were listed in 2012.

[The houses at] Water Lane, Histon… are designated at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest: the building is a development of an innovative spatial approach that uses balconies and bridge construction, employing the architect's signature recessed dormers to particularly good effect.

Interior: the flexibility of the design and construction is illustrated by the difference between the interiors of the two houses, although the flow of space through interconnected areas is used in both.

Intactness: the design remains almost completely intact, with minor alterations made in the spirit of the original. The use of contrasting colour and texture in materials remains a key feature.

The years after 1955 saw the rapid expansion of the private house market. Most of these houses were speculatively built to conventional plans, but a significant if small number of clients looked to an architect-built house that more closely responded to their lifestyle. Many young architects built houses for themselves or their immediate family…  These were seen as an exercise in self-promotion or a 'calling card', but developed as a fashion in their own right. The erratic distribution of these houses was aided in Cambridge by a cheap mortgage policy run by the University that encouraged young lecturers in the School of Architecture to build their own homes. In the case of Histon the houses were designed for fellow architects Gerry Craig and Richard Powell and their families in 1972 by David Thurlow, shortly after he had set up the Cambridge Design Group in 1970. Thurlow (b.1939) initially worked as a council architect, and was an assistant to Colin St John Wilson…. Although the structural and external design of Water Lane were David Thurlow's, the interiors are said to have been the work of the individual architects; his clients.

MATERIALS: the piers and cross-walls are buff-brick, with a timber first-floor structure above. Windows are timber framed and double-glazed, with load-bearing window frames.