The Towers Arms Inn

BRENTWOOD

TQ5793 WEALD ROAD, South Weald 723-1/16/298 (South side) 21/10/58 The Tower Arms Inn

GV II

Public house. Dated 1704. Red brick with chequered burnt headers, hipped, peg-tiled roof with deep modillioned eaves cornice and prominent stacks on end walls. Rectangular plan. EXTERIOR: 2 storey and attics. N front elevation, 5 bays with string course between ground and first floors and chamfered plinth. Central front door and pedimented dormers with casement windows, 2x3 panes, over bays 2 and 4. All other windows are C19 mullioned and transomed casements with glazing bars, 2x3 panes, gauged brick voussoirs, shaped over central first-floor window. Front doorway, panelled pilasters with capitals, pulvinated frieze cornice, hood on carved console brackets, lugged architrave, door with 8 panels, lower 6 fielded, upper 2 now glazed. Above, datestone, initials, L above, AA below and 1704. S, rear elevation rendered and colourwashed, 5 bays, all windows have early C18 frames with moulded architraves and mullions and transoms with C20 replacement casements with glazing bars, 4x6 panes. Ground floor, central doorway , flat hood on shaped brackets, door, 4 lower flush beaded panels, upper 2 glazed. To W deep C20 ground-floor extension. To E window with lower casement now plate glass. First floor, 4 symmetrical windows and a central stair window dropped to half storey height, 2 gabled dormers in bays 2 and 4 with 2-light casements, 4x3 panes. E end elevation, brickwork and roof as front, central C19 door with wooden porch, door, 2 lower flush, beaded panels, upper 2 glazed. First-floor window above, C19 2-light casement set in C18 aperture, with central glazing bars, 2x2 panes. Large central stack above with 2 recessed panels. W end elevation, bricwork and roof as front, 3 bays with 6 symmetrical window apertures with gauged brick voussoirs, outer 4 blind, inner 2 blocked, early C18 stack as on E elevation, but upper part is C20 rebuild, more slender and plain. INTERIOR: original central dogleg, close string staircase and dado, with ground-floor stair arch, with shaped handrail, rises to attic, balusters alternating, turned and twisted. 2 ground floor rooms at W end with original panelling. S room of pair has original fire surround with well moulded lugged architrave. A photograph, kept at the inn, taken about 1903 shows the original casement windows with small leaded panes. Luptons (qv), Wealdcote and granary (qv), The Cottage (qv), The Post Office (qv) and the Tower Arms form a group. (RCHM: Central and SW Essex : Monument 10: 217).

Listing NGR: TQ5713993798