Stowes And Mildmay

This is a house dating to the late medieval period, significantly altered in the 17th and 18th centuries. It is timber-framed, with plaster rendering and a roof of handmade red clay tiles. The main range is three bays wide, facing north, and contains a large axial stack from the late 16th century in the middle bay. A two-bay crosswing is located at the right end, with an 18th-century one-bay extension projecting beyond it, and an external stack at the rear. A parallel range extends to the rear of the main range and crosswing, likely dating to the 17th or 18th century. The house has two storeys, with a cellar beneath the right-hand bay.

The ground floor features a splayed bay and three 20th-century casement windows. The first floor has five early 19th-century sash windows of 16 lights, including one which has been blanked off and painted. There is a four-panel door within a fluted doorcase with a shallow hood, and another four-panel door in a moulded doorcase with a shallow hood. The left end of the roof is hipped, while the right end is half-hipped, and rebuilt diagonal shafts are visible at the top. A 19th-century entrance hall was created by cutting through the main stack, with the flues on each side arching above.

Stowes comprises the left end of the house, and Mildmay the right end. Inside Stowes, plaster largely obscures the timber frame, though evidence suggests this was the service end of the original medieval house. In Mildmay, some of the plaster has been removed, revealing an unglazed window with a single diamond mullion in the right wall of the crosswing, now incorporated into the 18th-century extension. The hall has an inserted floor with a chamfered axial beam with run-out stops. The floor level of the right crosswing has been raised approximately 0.5 metres, and the walls of the hall and crosswing have similarly been raised in the 17th and 18th centuries, creating a continuous range and roof with no visible indication of the original layout externally.