The Ceders

The Cedars is an inn and house, now a house, located on Church Street in Coggeshall. It dates from the 17th century with additions around 1800 and further extension in the early 20th century. The building is timber-framed and plastered, roofed with hand-cut grey slates.

The structure comprises a 17th-century range aligned north-east to south-west with an axial stack one bay from the north-east end, a parallel range to the north-west dating from around 1800 with an internal stack to the rear of the right part, and an early 20th-century extension to the north projecting forward of the main elevation with an irregular plan to align with the street and one internal stack. The building rises to two storeys and includes a belvedere.

The north-west elevation facing the street displays a two-window range of original sash windows of 12 lights with false flat arches and projecting keystones, together with one sash window over the door featuring a semi-circular false arch, keystones, and interlaced Gothick tracery in the upper sash. The central six-panel door has flush bottom panels, raised ovals in the middle panels, and glazed top panels, set within a doorcase with engaged columns, a triglyph frieze, and a moulded pediment. Four moulded stone steps with two wrought iron bootscrapers lead to the entrance. Long projecting eaves with paired brackets support a hipped roof of shallow pitch with a central well. Stacks of gault brick rise above the roof line. A central belvedere of early 20th-century date stands as a rectangular structure with shallow hipped roof, weatherboarded below continuous glazing and topped with an iron finial. Cast iron railings run along the street boundary with eight cruciform section stanchions to the right of the door and five to the left, connected by two rails of diamond section; additional railings return to the house each side of the door and to a connecting brick wall at the right end, and connect to the projecting extension at the left end. The left extension incorporates an earlier brick wall to first-floor level.

The rear elevation contains three French windows with marginal lights and a half-glazed door under a latticed wooden canopy with glass roof, with three similar first-floor windows above. The right return features one window on each floor in front of the brick wall, matching those at the front. Much original crown glass survives throughout all windows.

Internally, a central entrance hall extends through the house, marked by a richly ornamented semi-circular arch at the junction of the two ranges. A geometrical stair, probably sited where an original axial stack stood before demolition during the around 1800 remodelling, features a wreathed and moulded mahogany handrail, stick balusters, and scrolled tread-ends. A Gothick niche with fluted jambs and an ogee head occupies the upper wall. Moulded six-panel mahogany doors open to all adjacent rooms. White marble fireplaces date from around 1800, and plaster ceiling cornices are present throughout. Storey height is approximately three metres.

The rear left room retains an early 18th-century dado of fielded pine panelling, a 17th-century oak overmantel, and alcoves with semi-elliptical arches on each side; the cast iron grate is reported to have been introduced from Yorkshire in the late 19th century. On the first floor of the stair hall stands a plain semi-elliptical arch. Rooms of the rear range have moulded oak beams and 17th-century six-panel oak doors. The belvedere incorporates 18th-century wrought iron casements with moulded mullions and saddle bars.

The rear range survives from the former Green dragon Inn, the remainder of which was demolished in 1809 by Thomas Andrewes, a solicitor.