131-133, MELTON HIGH STREET

A farmhouse and cottage incorporating fragments of a timber-framed aisled building probably of late medieval date, with 18th-century and early 19th-century alterations and additions. The construction is mainly rubble stone but includes areas of brickwork. The modern roof covering is not of special interest.

Plan and Layout

The building has evolved through its history into its current form. It is of two storeys with two ranges forming an L-shape. An east-west three-bay range with end stacks fronts onto the road to the north, forming 131 Melton High Street. A lower three-bay range extends southwards with a single-storey outshut to the rear (west) partially filling the angle between the two ranges, with the southern part of this range forming number 133.

The front range is a three-bay, central stair plan with a central door to the south opening onto a very narrow hall. This gives access to the rooms at either end of the range, the dog-leg stair down to the cellar (behind the central stair, lit by the central ground-floor window in the north wall), and via the outshut to the northern room of the north-south range. This room has an external door to the east. There is also an entrance in the east gable wall. The cellar has two rooms and lies beneath the westernmost bay of the building. The rest of the north-south range is undivided and forms number 133, which is one up one down with the stair placed in the outshut and an external door to the east.

North Elevation

At first appearance this is symmetrical with three bays. The central windows are small, with raised coped gables and rebuilt end ridge stacks. Closer inspection reveals at least two breaks in the stonework indicating that the two right-hand bays were added, initially single-storey and then raised to two storeys. The small central windows are stone-framed. The larger windows to the outer bays have thin cills with deeper stone lintels, the upper windows retaining four-pane sashes.

East Elevation

This is mainly of rubble stonework, but with some patching with brick (mainly 18th-century or early 19th-century handmade bricks), along with at least one section of exposed timber which is probably a former lintel rather than a fragment of timber framing. The elevation is of four uneven bays with scattered fenestration and a ridge stack to the centre. The right-hand bay now forms the gable end of the east-west range. This gable end has a near-central doorway with two inserted first-floor windows. The chimney stack has been rebuilt in machine-made brick and rises from the right corner to angle across at attic level to the ridge.

The northernmost bay of the north-south range has a doorway considered to be 17th-century in date, formed from heavily weathered, substantial stonework with a deep, monolithic lintel supported by composite jambs, the whole opening having a slight chamfer. The door itself is late 19th-century or early 20th-century and is not of particular interest. Immediately to the left there is a later inserted window with a deep stone lintel and shallow cill with later modern joinery not of special interest. Above, offset to the left, is another inserted window with a neatly dressed projecting stone cill with margin tooling suggestive of an 18th-century date. A similar window is at the far south end of the elevation above a doorway also considered to be 18th-century with neatly dressed monolithic jambs supporting a deep lintel. This window retains a twelve-pane Yorkshire sliding sash.

The central bay of the north-south range has an unusually large ground-floor window. This appears to be an 18th-century insertion with an area of handmade brickwork to the side. The window is of thirty-two panes (eight across by four down) with a horizontal sliding sash forming the central lower two by three panes. Above, offset to the right, is a small window which was boarded over at the time of inspection.

South Elevation

The gable end of the north-south range was formerly an internal wall that was plastered on the ground floor and had exposed brickwork (of handmade bricks) on the upper floor that was open to the roof structure. The gable retains sawn-off wall plates, double purlins, and a diagonally set ridge beam. The wall plate to the west was originally an aisle plate and is supported by the aisle post and brace exposed at the junction between the rear outshut and the north-south range. The brickwork is of several phases and is mainly of handmade bricks.

The south elevation of the east-west range has a near-central door which appears inserted and is cramped by the rear outshut. Above, slightly to the east, is a small window. Larger windows occupy the bay to the west at both ground and first-floor levels, the upper floor retaining a four-pane sash.

West Elevation

The gable end of the east-west range is rendered. It has a single opening: a four-pane sash to the right on the ground floor. The west elevation of the north-south range is mainly covered by the rear outshut which has a straight joint in the stonework, suggestive that it was built in two phases. It has two windows, the one to the right being smaller and set higher. This lights the stair to number 133. The outshut at one time continued further south, but this has been truncated, exposing a former internal wall of handmade brickwork. This is adjacent to the exposed aisle post and represents several phases of construction and alteration.

Interior

The north-south range retains broad floorboards to the first floor and exposed beams that are plain and not chamfered. The east-west range retains early 19th-century architraves, with most other internal joinery in the building being modern and not of special interest.

The roof structure of the northern part of the north-south range appears to be a coupled rafter construction without purlins. The east-west range and the southern part of the north-south range is double purlined with ridge beams all spanning between masonry walls. Although the roof structure includes some modern sawn timber, most is hewn timber. Pegged housings in some of the rafters in the east-west range suggest that there was a raised loft floor at some time or that these timbers are reused.

History

The building is thought to be late medieval in origin, a timber-framed, aisled construction. This was encased in stonework, probably before 1700, certainly by the mid-18th century. The doorway with the heavily weathered composite jambs is thought to date to the 17th century and may have been at one end of a cross passage, with a central hearth in the position of the later central chimney stack. Most of the other openings in the north-south range are thought to be 18th-century insertions.

The east end of the east-west range is thought to be a rebuild of the northern end of the original building. This was then extended to the west with a single storey above a cellar. This extension was then raised to two storeys and the frontage modelled to be symmetrical, probably in the late 18th century or early 19th century. It is speculated that this last remodelling resulted from improved finances following the parliamentary enclosure of the open fields which occurred in 1814. The cottage to the rear may have at one time been used for commercial purposes, possibly as a shop or workshop, explaining the unusually large size of the ground-floor window.

The building is designated at Grade II as a vernacular building that is pre-1700 in origin and evolved into its current form by 1840, with particular interest in retaining fragments of a possible late medieval timber-framed aisled building, and for group value with the nearby stable/barn to the north of 143-145 Melton High Street which also retains evidence of timber framing.