Former Little Coggeshall Brewery

The former Little Coggeshall Brewery is an early 19th-century brewery, a compact group of interconnected industrial buildings situated on Bridge Street in Coggeshall. The buildings are constructed of red brick in Flemish bond, timber framing with weatherboarding, and feature roofs of handmade red plain tiles, red clay pantiles, and slate.

The brewery comprises several distinct blocks. The main brewing house runs north-south, featuring brick, timber-framed, and weatherboarded sections with wooden louvres above, all crowned with a hipped roof of plain tiles and pantiles. A tapering round chimney sits on a square base to the southwest. A timber-framed block, aligned east-west, serves as beer store number one, with a tiled hipped roof. A small brick building to the southwest, along with a connecting link, connects to the main brewery. A long range extends eastwards, aligned north-south, and has a hipped slate roof. Finally, a malthouse to the east, aligned east-west, is built of brick with a slate roof, partially hipped at the east end.

The buildings are predominantly two stories high. The south elevation of the brewing house (block 1) exhibits two two-story recessed areas with segmental arches – the left with a blank opening on the ground floor and a louvre above, the right with a casement window on the ground floor and a blank aperture above, both framed by segmental arches. Central double doors provide access. The upper portion of this elevation is largely clad with pivoted louvres. Block 5’s south elevation has two plain boarded doors on the ground floor (one damaged), a 20th-century casement in an original segmental-arched opening, and a first-floor C19 horizontal sash window with 8+8 lights, alongside another blank aperture, culminating in a dentilled eaves cornice. The west end of the malthouse (block 6), facing Bridge Street, features a wide entrance with a semi-elliptical arch, weatherboarded above.

Inside block 1, a large plinth remains, indicating the former location of a brewing pan and the furnace beneath. Block 5 has been partially converted into stables, with wooden stall divisions and hayracks. The brewery buildings were largely disused in May 1987, though some were used for storage. A picture-framing workshop occupies part of the ground floor of block 5 and the entire first floor of block 6. Gardner’s Brewery, formerly at this site, ceased operation in 1940 but was preserved in working order as a secondary facility in anticipation of potential wartime damage to Greene King's brewery. A map from 1832 accurately depicts the current layout of the buildings.