Tudor House Museum

The Tudor House Museum is a timber-framed building dating from the 16th century, likely constructed circa 1575-1625. It was subsequently used as houses, a Cross Keys Tavern from around 1765, and a coffee house in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The rear wings were largely rebuilt in the early to mid 18th century, using brick. The building has plain clay tile roofs and two large, altered sandstone and brick stacks on the rear elevation.

The main front range comprises four bays, with ground-floor alterations and internal party walls that do not align with the bays. Rear wings extend at right angles to the main range, with an 18th-century carriage drive inserted to the right of the centre, providing access to the rear.

The exterior is two storeys with attics and a cellar. The front elevation features timber framing with rendered infill, with the upper floor jettied and incorporating a mid-rail to the studding. Box framing is present on the remainder of the building. The upper floor has four windows with mullion and transom casements, containing leaded lights; these replaced earlier oriel windows. A 19th-century shopfront occupies the left-hand ground floor, while two 2/2 sash windows are located to the right. The north elevation of the rear wing, on the right-hand side, has arched windows, including an early to mid-19th-century 3-light iron casement in a wooden frame, with plat bands marking the first and second floors. The south wing of the rear elevation reveals timber framing, with a central jowled post remaining from a 16th-century workshop range that originally extended further to the rear.

Inside the front range is a queen-post roof with clasped purlins and straight wind-braces. Three open fireplaces are present, with wood bressumers; the one to the right is moulded and likely a reset. A mid-18th-century panelled dado adorns a ground-floor room to the right. The upper floors originally had ceilings, with a chamfered beam exposed to the right and a particularly fine early 17th-century moulded plasterwork ceiling to the left of centre; this features flowing curved ribs enclosing motifs of a prancing horse, fleur-de-lys, and rosettes, with a central beam decorated with a running vine pattern in relief. A mid-18th-century staircase, a quarter-turn with winders, has been altered with early 20th-century newel posts and features turned balusters on a closed string. The rear wing to the north (right) contains clasped purlins and a queen-post truss, primarily constructed using reused timbers.

The rear wings were originally longer and were used as loomshops.