Days Farmhouse

Days Farmhouse is a timber-framed house of the 16th, early 17th, and 20th centuries, located on the east side of Days Lane in Doddinghurst. The building displays an L-plan with an additional rear block arranged in a staggered, zigzag formation. The main part is rendered, while the ground floor is weatherboarded, and the roofs are covered with peg tiles. It consists of two storeys and attics.

The facade features a central cross-wing gable with a flush range to the east and a second range running west at the rear of the cross-wing. An outshut to the west of the rear block has a roof that forms a continuous run from the hipped end of the range. All windows are wooden 20th-century casements with leaded diamond lattices.

The front range has a ground floor with a 20th-century boarded door with two glazed lights, one narrow three-light window, and one two-light window. A 20th-century glazed timber-framed gabled porch has been built on to a 20th-century gabled projecting lobby, which contains a boarded door with a small light. The first floor has two two-light windows and one narrow three-light window. The gable attic has one narrow three-light window. The rear extension to the west has casement windows on both ground and first floors.

The principal chimney stack, dating to the 17th century, rises behind the roof apex to the east of the facade gable. A secondary 19th-century stack rises from the rear projecting block. The rear elevation shows irregular window ranges on both ground and first floors. The principal stack displays two phases: 17th-century brickwork with a vertical triangular fillet and a rebuilt 18th to 19th-century section abutting to the west. A small 19th-century stack stands at the east of the rear block.

Interior and exterior framing reveals three probable building phases. The first phase dates to the early to mid-16th century and comprises the rear range, which features stud-braced walling with arched braces, rather than the usual tension-braced form, and edge-halved and bridled scarf joints. This range consists of three bays with a simple crown post roof and no decoration. Its original purpose is unclear. Mullion holes have been found at first floor level, and both ground and first floors may have each been single through rooms. There is no evidence of original heating.

The second phase consists of a cross-wing to the north, simply built against phase one as two storeys and taller than the earlier range. It features clasped side purlins. The ground floor ceiling has a bridging joist with cyma mouldings. The first floor ceiling has a principal joist, oddly positioned off-centre, with lamb's tongue stopped chamfers. Both ceilings are crudely matched to the older existing block. An ovolo-moulded mullioned window was found in the west wall during restoration. Fireplaces on both floors on the east side appear to be contemporary with this phase, dating to approximately 1600. Both fireplaces have plain timber lintels and brickwork, now much restored.

The third phase represents a typical late 16th or early 17th-century extension added to the east of the cross-wing. It comprises an internal stair tower adjacent to an additional fireplace, backed on to an existing one. Door frame evidence suggests that the cross-wing and the new range are not contemporary, and that the cross-wing predates the eastern extension. Phase three floor joists have deep-sectioned diminished haunched soffit tenons, and the bridging joist features lamb's tongue chamfer stops. The first-floor fireplace has a moulded timber lintel decorated with rolls, cyma, and hollow mouldings. Above the lintel, a Biblical text in black letter, from James Chapter 4, verses 7 to 17, is painted on the plaster surface, along with a shorter text not yet identified.

Although the house complex consists of three builds, the early range is plain, with a 16th-century crown post roof, in contrast to the final phase, which displays a more developed 17th-century style. The exterior wall framing styles of both early phases are similar, employing unusual arched stud braces.