Grass Green Farmhouse is a Grade II listed building in the Braintree local planning authority area, England. First listed on 29 August 1984. House. 1 related planning application.
Grass Green Farmhouse
- WRENN ID
- sheer-tallow-rain
- Grade
- II
- Local Planning Authority
- Braintree
- Constituency
- Braintree MP: Sir James Cleverly (Con)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 29 August 1984
- Type
- House
- Address
- Grass Green Farmhouse, Stambourne Road, Toppesfield, CO9 4NB
- OS grid reference
- TL 735 382
- Coordinates
- 52.01593, 0.52696
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
Grass Green Farmhouse is a house dating from the 16th century, with alterations made in the early 17th century and the 20th century. It is timber framed and plastered, with a roof covered in machine-made red clay tiles. The main range is three bays long and aligned northwest to southeast, featuring an axial chimney stack at the southeast end of the middle bay. There is a three-bay northwest crosswing that jetties out to the northeast. The farmhouse has a modern single-storey rear extension with a slate lean-to roof. The main range is a single storey with attics, while the crosswing has two storeys.
The exterior includes a 20th-century door and four 20th-century casement windows. Below the jetty, there are two plain brackets and exposed joist ends. On the first floor, there are two 20th-century casement windows, one of which is located in a swept dormer. Inside, the structure features jowled posts. The floor in the southeast bay is original, made of lodged joists with a square section arranged longitudinally. The middle bay has a floor added around 1600, with a plain-chamfered axial beam and plain-chamfered joists of horizontal section that include lamb's tongue stops. The northwest bay of the main range is open, serving as a stair hall. The crosswing contains plain-chamfered binding and bridging beams with step stops, as well as plain-chamfered joists of horizontal section with step stops.
A significant renovation in 1967 led to some alterations in the southwest bay and the rebuilding of the roof. Both internal tiebeams in the main range have been removed. The large wood-burning hearth, made of 330mm brickwork, dates to around 1600. Evidence suggests that this building was originally a late hall house that was converted to have an upper storey throughout around 1600.
Local climate
Grass Green Farmhouse sits in a drier-than-average part of the UK, with an average of 700 mm of rain a year. This makes it drier than 90% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is lower than that of 77% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 32 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 58% of listed buildings. Of these, 16 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
More on this building
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- No EPC on record for this property
- Sale history — 1 transaction since 2017
- Related listed building consents — 1 application
- Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
- Flood risk assessment
- Radon risk assessment
- Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
Matched applications, energy data and sale records are assembled automatically and may contain errors. Flag incorrect data.
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