Dodd'S Farmhouse

Dodd's Farmhouse is a timber-framed house of 15th and late 16th-century date, extended and renovated around 1966 by J Amor. It stands on the south side of Blackmore Road, Ingatestone, and is constructed of timber-framing with plaster and weatherboarding, roofed with handmade red clay tiles.

The building has an irregular H-plan with multiple lean-to extensions, comprising eight distinct structural components: a late 16th-century main range of 2 bays facing northeast with an axial stack in the shorter right bay (late 16th and 17th centuries); a late 16th-century cross-wing of 2 bays to the left with a 17th-century internal stack in the rear bay against the left wall; a full-length lean-to to the left, mainly 20th century but of earlier origin; a 15th-century cross-wing of 2 bays to the right of the main range; a 20th-century extension to the rear of this cross-wing; a lean-to containing the stair; a 20th-century lean-to to the rear of the left bay of the main range; and a 20th-century extension in front of the right cross-wing with a lean-to porch to its left. The house is 2 storeys high.

The exterior features two early 19th-century 3-light casement windows of 6+6+6 lights on both ground and first floors of the main elevation. The fixed lights to each side are original with some handmade glass, though the central casements were replaced in the 20th century to a similar pattern. A 20th-century glazed door is present. The rear elevation has two similar windows on the first floor. The right elevation contains one similar window on the ground floor and two on the first floor. The front elevation is plastered; the left and rear elevations are mainly weatherboarded; the right elevation is of painted brickwork on the ground floor with weatherboarding above.

Internally, the left bay of the main range features a chamfered axial beam jointed to a chamfered binding beam, both with lamb's tongue stops, and plain joists of vertical section lodged on original girts. An original doorway in the right bay stands in front of the stack, with the doorhead missing, forming a lobby-entrance. The doorway to the right into the earlier cross-wing has been closed by brickwork, probably when the house was converted to cottages. A large wood-burning hearth facing left with 0.33-metre jambs dates to the late 16th century and has a 20th-century mantel beam. Back-to-back with it is a 17th-century stack featuring a large wood-burning hearth with 0.23-metre jambs and a chamfered mantel beam with lamb's tongue stops. The first-floor hearth facing left has a 20th-century mantel beam. In the rear wall, all the ground-floor studding is missing, and some first-floor studding has also been lost. An original doorway to the stair tower to the rear of the stack has chamfered posts with lamb's tongue stops and a severed doorhead; the height of the tower has been reduced to form a lean-to.

The left cross-wing contains in its rear bay a chamfered axial beam with lamb's tongue stops and plain joists of vertical section. In the front bay, all joists have been replaced, including some of reused timber of horizontal section. Ground-floor studding to the left of the front bay is missing; the girt has 3 diamond mortices and the shutter groove of a former unglazed window. The building exhibits unjowled posts, primary straight bracing, heavy studding in upper walls, an almost straight central tie-beam, and a clasped purlin roof. This combination of features is closely datable to the final years of the 16th century. The main range appears to be integrated with this wing and of the same date, as is the left part of the stack.

The right cross-wing is of particular architectural interest and apparently of a strange and possibly unique type. It appears to have been built originally as a medieval open hall or kitchen and was converted in the late 15th century to a 2-storey building with a jetty to the front. It is 4 metres in span, 6.55 metres long on the upper floor, and 4.27 metres high to the wallplates. The posts are unjowled; much of the studding of the lower storey on the right side has been replaced by brickwork, with the 17th-century hearth on the left and missing at the front. The central binding beam has been mutilated at one end to gain clearance. Almost all joists are rafters reused at an early date, retaining the natural taper of the trees, with smaller ends central-tenoned into oversized mortices in the binding beam. Two of them still bear sawn-off oblique pegs at the other end from their original jointing to a wallplate. Near the front end they show pressure marks from a jetty, now underbuilt. The joists of the rear bay are plastered to the soffits, but the uneven and inclined surface suggests early work. The upper part of the right middle post has been reduced and rebated to form a doorway, probably when the present 2-storey main range was built against the earlier cross-wing.

The front tie-beam is moulded, originally to a bowtell in great casement but now mutilated, with diamond mortices for two unglazed windows, each originally having three mullions separated by a stud, with a long square groove for sliding shutters. The front gable is intact but now enclosed by the front extension; it displays heavy studding and two near-straight braces trenched to the outside, all characteristic of the late 15th century. The roof is of collar-rafter construction with all but two couples heavily smoke-blackened, while the gable shows no trace of smoke, indicating it was built after the remainder of the roof ceased to be used as an open hall or kitchen. At the rear, an intact gablet hip is enclosed by the later extension and bears mortices through the last two rafter couples for the supporting structure of a bonnet to protect the smoke vent from rain. The original pegs of the smoke-blackened couples are finely finished with chamfered arrises, suggesting a 14th-century origin. Two less well-finished couples without smoke-blackening have been inserted at the second build. There is no evidence of a crown-post or collar-purlin structure. The building shows no evidence of having been dismantled and re-erected; it must therefore be either the hall of the house which previously served the holding, or a formerly detached kitchen. The absence of any evidence of partitioning suggests the latter.

The early 19th-century casement windows are of exceptional interest and merit special care. The frames are of jointed and pegged hardwood, with most mullions and frames chamfered and mitred, some beaded. The original glazing bars are slender and elegantly moulded. Where the central casements have been replaced, they are probably of softwood with slightly heavier glazing bar sections. The house is unusual in having escaped Georgianisation through the introduction of sash windows, and its character has been carefully retained in renovation.