April Cottage

April Cottage is a house that dates back to the late medieval period, with alterations made in the 18th and 20th centuries. It features a timber frame that is plastered, and has a thatched roof. The building has a two-bay hall that faces southwest, with a parlour or solar bay to the left and an 18th-century extension to the right, which was built on the site of the original service end. There are external stacks at each end of the house, and a two-storey extension added to the rear in the 20th century, which has a red tiled canopy at the rear left angle.

The house is two storeys high. On the ground floor, there are two 19th-century horizontally sliding sash windows with 12 lights each, one with 9 lights, two 20th-century casement windows, and 20th-century French windows. The first floor features two 19th-century horizontally sliding sash windows with 12 lights and two with 9 lights. A 20th-century door is located in the gabled porch.

The structure includes jowled posts and heavy studding. The parlour/solar bay retains its original floor, which consists of lodged plain joists of horizontal section, with one curved brace that is trenched into the studs of the partition to the hall. There is a blocked doorway with a plain head. An inserted timber frame, likely from the 17th century, is found in the left wall, enclosing a 20th-century grate on the ground floor and a blocked hearth on the first floor.

The hall has front and back doorways with plain heads that are blocked at the right end, and pegholes for the original fixed bench at the left end. The transverse beam of the inserted floor is plastered over, with plain joists of horizontal section supported on a pegged clamp in the left bay, and thin vertical joists in the right bay. It is believed that a stack was inserted in the right bay around 1600 and removed in the 18th century, at which time the floor would have been re-laid. The walls have been raised approximately 1.30 metres, and the roof was rebuilt in the 17th or 18th century.