Serjeant Bendlowes Cottage

Serjeant Bendlowes Cottage is a Grade II listed building located on the north side of Brook Street in Great Bardfield. This structure consists of two buildings that were previously listed separately but are now combined into one listing. The house dates from the early 17th century, while the cottage is from the 18th or 19th century, with the two being joined in the 20th century.

The cottage is timber framed and plastered, featuring some exposed framing. The roofs are thatched, with the central part of the front covered in handmade red clay tiles. The house has four bays facing south, with a central stack that creates a lobby entrance. The left end of the house is set at an obtuse angle to the front, following the line of Crown Street. There is an 18th or 19th-century extension at the rear of the left end, which includes an internal stack at the corner. To the right, there is a cottage of three bays that is positioned at right angles to the street, also from the 18th or 19th century and now combined with the larger house. The building is one storey with attics, featuring six late 19th-century Gothic Revival casements and two additional casements in tiled gabled dormers. The lower windows have plain labels above them, and the dormers have late 19th-century pierced bargeboards. The entrance features a plain boarded door, and the stack has grouped diagonal shafts.

The roof of the cottage is half-hipped at both the front and back. Inside the house, there are jowled posts, exposed studding, chamfered transverse beams with plain stops, and exposed square-section joists. The roof structure includes clasped purlins with some reused smoke-blackened rafters. The cottage has unjowled posts, exposed studding with primary straight bracing, and a mix of pegged joints and mostly nailed connections. The current attic floor is at wallplate level, but there are signs that it was once lower.

Serjeant Bendlowe's Cottage belonged to Bendlowe's Charity until 1951 and was previously divided into four almshouses.