Spice'S Farmhouse

Spice's Farmhouse is a house dating from about 1400, with alterations made in the 16th and 17th centuries. It is timber framed, with plaster walls and a roof of handmade red clay tiles. The original layout comprised a two-bay hall facing south-east, with a central 16th-century internal stack in the left bay, slightly off-centre. To the right of the hall is a two-bay parlour/solar crosswing, with the service end now missing. A further two-bay extension was added in the mid-16th century, projecting outwards at an obtuse angle to the earlier parts of the house. An early 17th-century extension was built to the rear of this junction, and an 18th- or 19th-century single-storey lean-to extension is located in the right rear angle, though much altered in the 20th century.

The main block and the early 17th-century rear wing are one storey high with attics, while the remainder of the house is two storeys high. The ground floor has four 20th-century casement windows. The first floor has two casement windows and a further window within a gabled dormer. A 20th-century door is set within a gabled porch on the right return wall. Original twin service doorways with three-centred arched heads have been converted into 20th-century arched windows in the left return wall.

The hall block features jowled posts, a blocked original front doorway with a three-centred arched head, edge-halved and bridled scarfs in the wallplates, and a crownpost roof with a cross-quadrate crownpost and steep arched bracing of thick section. The inserted stack leaves the original cross-entry unobstructed; the lower section has been rebuilt in 18th-century brick, while the upper section is original 16th-century work. The central tiebeam has been cut and a splint added above it, shaped to resemble the head of a former fireplace. A smaller Tudor head has also been cut into the soffit of the tiebeam, the purpose of which is unknown, possibly related to a former staircase beside the stack. A floor inserted in the mid-16th century has moulded axial and transverse beams with foliate carved stops, and moulded joists.

The crosswing has an underbuilt jetty at the front and retains close studding, diamond mortices, and grooves for unglazed windows on the front, rear, and right side. It also has a crownpost roof lacking its original hip, central tiebeam, crownpost, and collar-purlin. The right-hand extension has jowled posts, close studding, a chamfered axial beam, plain joists joined at an angle, and a crownpost roof with thin axial braces. Large wood-burning hearths are back to back, and the early brick floor is a notable feature. The early 17th-century rear wing has an oak-panelled door, likely introduced, with a clasped purlin roof. The building's development reflects the agricultural prosperity of the 16th century, the expansion of high-end accommodation characteristic of the period, and the subsequent reduction in the quality of the lower-end accommodation.