8, East Street

This house, located on the south side of East Street in Coggeshall, dates to the 15th century and the 17th century, with alterations made in the 19th and 20th centuries. It is constructed of timber framing, with plaster and weatherboard cladding, and has a roof of handmade red plain tiles. Originally a hall house, the building retains a 2-bay service crosswing from the 15th century, which was part of the earlier hall. An early 17th-century wing was built parallel to the original crosswing on the site of the former hall, and a further wing was added to the rear of this wing. A 19th-century extension sits at the right rear, along with a single-story addition.

The front elevation features an early 19th-century sash window with 12 lights, and a 19th-century shopfront with six transomed lights, pilasters with carved floral details, and a moulded fascia. Double doors with half-glazed panels provide access. First-floor windows are 20th-century square oriels with rectangular leading. The front of the building is plastered with 20th-century decorative panels, while other elevations are weatherboarded. The roofs were rebuilt in the 18th or early 19th century and are integrated with hipped designs.

At the rear of the rear wing is a re-sited wrought iron casement from around 1800, reversed to open inwards. The earlier wing exhibits jowled and chamfered posts with step stops, an underbuilt jetty at the front, and a rebate for the shutters of a former unglazed window. The internal partition studding has been removed, raising the joists and leaving visible the tenons of the floor jointing. A rear tiebeam contains a groove for a sliding shutter and three diamond mortices. The roof over the rear bay is a crownpost roof, extensively restored with inserted axial braces and a collar purlin. The left wing’s original clasped purlin roof is largely concealed within the later roof structure. The rear wing has a chamfered axial beam, plain vertical joists, and an underbuilt jetty, the plate of which shows mortices for a full-length early glazed window. A weathered timber piece dating back to the 15th century is attached. Evidence suggests a former oriel window existed above the jetty, along with a blocked flank window with an ovolo mullion. The roof features primary straight bracing and a clasped purlin roof with a short, edge-halved and bridled scarf in the right wallplate.

A wood-burning hearth on the ground floor has a replaced mantel beam carved with a folded leaf design, chamfered with lamb's tongue stops. These and other interior features are likely the work of Ernest Beckwith, a wood carver who occupied the property around 1900, and who was involved in the restoration of Paycockes, West Street, Thaxted Moot Hall, and various buildings in Coggeshall and Kelvedon. The carving is of high quality, but combines characteristics from different periods. Other features attributable to Beckwith include a 4-centred doorhead in the entrance passage and a similar doorway to a toilet. A hearth on the first floor has been rebuilt.