463 listed buildings, 5 of them Grade I

Reading Abbey RuinsGrade I listedReading Town HallGrade II* listedVachel Almhouses, 1-32 Castle StreetGrade II listedBuilding Now Part of Courage's BreweryGrade II listedThe George InnGrade II listed+35See all photos

Photos from Wikimedia Commons and Geograph, copied to our own server, each credited to its photographer with its licence; names open the building’s page or its official list entry.

c. 1840

1845

1890

1890

1893

1894

1900

1906

c. 1907

Public domain, from Wikimedia Commons, copied to our own server. Each credit opens the image’s page with its full description and history.

Historic England lists buildings in three grades: Grade I for buildings of exceptional interest (about 2.5% of all listed buildings), Grade II* for particularly important buildings of more than special interest (about 5.8%), and Grade II for buildings of special interest (about 91.7%). Listing protects the whole building, inside and out.

Every entry on the National Heritage List for England whose point lies inside the ONS 2022 built-up-area boundary. One list entry can cover a terrace or a group of buildings. Neighbourhood dots: the population-weighted centre of each Census 2021 output area, coloured by its neighbourhood’s (LSOA’s) share of homes built before 1919 (Valuation Office Agency, March 2025).

London Street29 listed

Castle Street21 listed · 1 II*

Southampton Street12 listed · 1 II*

Castle Hill10 listed

London Road10 listed

Oxford Road10 listed

Eldon Road8 listed

Eldon Square8 listed

Market Place8 listed

Russell Street8 listed

Friar Street7 listed

Gun Street7 listed

Of the 463 entries, 218 are named by a street address; the rest are named buildings such as churches, halls and bridges.

Search the rest on Historic England’s list →

Historic England’s conservation areas layer, supplied by councils (incomplete in places, so a page fact, never graded). Hectares are the part of each area inside the built-up area.

The first 3 entries were listed in 1951. 262 came in 1978, in the national resurvey of the 1970s and 80s. Only 14 have been added in the last 15 years.

2 scheduled monuments

Nationally important archaeological sites and monuments, protected by law; work on them needs consent from the Secretary of State, advised by Historic England.

High Bridge

Reading Abbey: a Cluniac and Benedictine monastery and Civil War earthwork.

3 registered parks and gardens

Prospect ParkGrade II

Reading CemeteryGrade II

The Forbury GardenGrade II

Two measures, each ranked against every UK town of 1,000 or more, with protected heritage counting twice as much as the age of homes. Protected heritage counts each listed building by its grade (Grade I three points, II* two, II one), each scheduled monument and battlefield two, and each registered park or garden by its grade; it is ranked both per 10,000 residents and as a total, so a village with one fine church doesn’t outrank a historic city. The second measure is the share of homes built before 1919, from the Valuation Office Agency’s council tax records. History is a character grade: it describes the town and isn’t part of the overall grade.

Thomas White

John Blagrave

William Laud

Constantine Phipps

Charles Simeon

Thomas Talfourd

Goldwin Smith

Alexander Ross Clarke

George Blackall Simonds

Edward Bagnall Poulton

George Alexander

Ernest Binfield Havell

Hugh Allen

Gavin Simonds, 1st Viscount Simonds

Kathleen Innes

Basil Cameron

Lilian Fontaine

Evelyn Roberts

Arthur Hambling

Len Andrews

1500165018001950

William Laud1573–1645 · Archbishop of Canterbury (1573-1645)

Edward Bagnall Poulton1856–1943 · Evolutionary biologist (1856–1943)

Alexander Ross Clarke1828–1914 · British geodesist (1828–1914)

George Alexander1858–1918 · British actor (1858–1918)

Goldwin Smith1823–1910 · British historian and journalist (1823–1910)

Ernest Binfield Havell1861–1934 · British art historian specializing in Indian art and architecture (18…

Lilian Fontaine1886–1975 · British actress (1886-1975)

Charles Simeon1759–1836 · British clergyman (1759-1836)

Everyone born in Reading → Birthplaces from Wikidata; portraits from Wikimedia Commons.

Reading has 463 listed buildings, 5 of them Grade I, including Reading Abbey. Abbey Gateway sits at the heart of it all, with 3 of the town’s Grade I buildings within 400 m. London Street alone has 29 listed buildings. Its older streets lie in 14 conservation areas, the first designated in 1972.

Of the whole list, 70% are houses, terraces and villas. Of the 69 people born here before 1900, the best known include William Laud (1573), Edward Bagnall Poulton (1856) and Alexander Ross Clarke (1828). More than half went on the list in a single year, 1978: 262 of 463. Beyond that, it has 5 Grade I buildings, about typical for a town its size (the middle one has 6); per resident it sits near the middle of UK towns; and it also has 2 scheduled monuments.