Former Little Coggeshall Brewery

TL 8422-8522 COGGESHALL BRIDGE STREET (east side)

9/25 Former Little Coggeshall Brewery

GV II

Brewery, disused. Early C19. Red brick in Flemish bond, and timber framed and weatherboarded, roofed with handmade red plain tiles, red clay pantiles and slate. Compact group of adjacent industrial buildings comprising (1) brewing house aligned N-S, brick, timber framed and weatherboarding and wooden louvres above with hipped roof of plain tiles and pantiles, (2) tapering round chimney on square base to SW, (3) timber framed block to N, aligned E-W, with tiled hipped roof (beer store no. 1), (4) small brick building to SW with tiled hipped roof, and connecting link, (5) long range to E of blocks 1 and 2, aligned N-S, with hipped slate roof, and (6) malthouse to E, aligned E-W, of brick with slate roof, half-hipped at E end only. Mainly 2 storeys. The S elevation of block 1 has two 2-storey recesses with segmental arches, the left with a blank aperture on the ground floor and a louvre above, both with segmental arches, the right with a casement on the ground floor and a blank aperture above, with similar arches; central double doors; the upper part is almost wholly clad with pivoted louvres. The S elevation of block 5 has on the ground floor 2 plain boarded doors (one broken) and a C20 casement in original aperture with segmental arch, and on the first floor one C19 horizontal sash of 8+8 lights and one blank aperture; dentilled eaves cornice. The W end of block 6 (facing the entrance from Bridge Street) has a wide entrance with semi- elliptical arch, weatherboarded above. Block 1 retains a large plinth for a brewing pan, with furnace below. Block 5 is partly fitted out as stables, with wooden stall divisions and hayracks. Most of the buildings are disused at time of survey, May 1987, or in limited use for storage. A picture-framing workshop occupies part of the ground floor of block 5 and the whole first floor of block 6. This was formerly Gardner's Brewery, which went out of use in 1940, but was retained in working order as 'shadow' premises against the possibility of bomb damage to Greene King's brewery. (J.S. Gardner (ed.), Coggeshall, Essex 1951, 32). A map of 1832 records the present buildings (Essex Record Office, D/DBs).

Listing NGR: TL8497822428