Browne'S Charity Almshouses And Chapel

BRENTWOOD

TQ5793 WIGLEY BUSH LANE, South Weald 723-1/16/299 (East side) 21/10/58 Nos.1-10 (consec) Browne's Charity Almshouses and Chapel (Formerly Listed as: VICARAGE LANE, South Weald (East side) The Almshouses (Browne's Charity))

II

Formerly known as: The Almshouses South Weald Village. Almshouses. 1858. By S Teulon. Red brick with stone dressings to windows and doors, peg-tiled roof. Long group, stepped down along Wigley Bush Lane. Plan comprises 10 cottage units in a row with central chapel with axis at right angles, group breaks forward roughly symmetrically each side of chapel and N and S end cottages have axes at right angles to create prominent gable ends as belvederes with ornamental figures in Gothic niches. A classical composition with Gothic detail. Well head, free standing, set at break forward, S of chapel. Cottage units single storey, with one large and one smaller room, expressed with 3-light and 2-light casement windows, front door between. Windows have mullions and transoms with diamond leaded panes. Doors boarded with iron work in arched doorhead with rectangular surround. Roof steep and eaves carried forward on brackets to create a pentice. Stack at each gable end. Chapel W gable end, buttressed angles, 3-light window in 2-centred arch with geometrical tracery, head stops to labels and lifted string course below framing. Cross and lozenges in burnt headers. Well head octagonal with pierced trefoiled lights containing a pump with date. Frieze with text from Proverbs below pointed roof. INTERIOR of typical house has narrow larder in line with front door and larger principal room with inscription on fireplace lintel. Bedroom undecorated. At rear, kitchen out-shut projects into house yard, free standing WC set away from back door in yard. The original arrangement of the rear of the houses now obscured in some units due to C20 rebuilding and addition encroaching and virtually filling some of the yards.

Listing NGR: TQ5715193611