Post Office

House with Post Office, Warley Road, Great Warley

A timber-framed and plastered building with a peg-tiled roof, dating from around 1500 with 19th-century modifications. The structure consists of a central one and a half storey range with two two-storey end cross-wings. A later timber-framed rear extension to the east cross-wing was restored in the 19th century.

The south elevation facade was refurbished, reportedly in 1850, and features decorative barge boards with finials to the gables, door hoods, and dormer windows. The east cross-wing is jettied, while the west cross-wing is underbuilt in brick. There is a central stack in front of the roof apex with two considerably rebuilt flanking end stacks.

Windows on the front elevation are principally sashes with glazing bars, featuring 4x4 panes. On the ground floor, the sequence runs east to west: a sash window under the jetty, a gabled hood doorway with a door featuring upper glazing with 4x4 panes (the central four with narrow outer borders), a 19th-century oriel window on brackets with a peg-tiled lean-to hood containing four lights and two side lights with upper frieze lights, a sash window, a gable hooded doorway with a beaded board door, and a sash window in the west cross-wing. The first floor features a cross-wing sash window, two gabled dormer windows in the central range with 2-light casement windows with 4x4 pane glazing bars, and a cross-wing sash window.

The rear north elevation reflects the front units, with the ground floor weatherboarded and the first floor rendered. A late timber-framed extension to the east cross-wing projects with 19th-century brick refacing and upper rendered surfaces. Windows on this elevation are irregular, including a 20th-century 2-light casement window with 2x3 panes, two 19th-century boarded doors, a 20th-century 2-light window, and a 19th-century 2-light casement window with 4x3 pane glazing bars. The first floor of this extension contains a 19th-century 2-light casement window with 2x2 panes, a 19th-century gabled dormer window matching those on the front elevation, and a 19th-century 2-light casement with one light featuring 2x3 pane glazing bars and the other with a single 20th-century transom bar. The west elevation of the 19th-century addition has two 19th-century casement windows, one 2-light and one single light. The central range ground floor has a 20th-century metal-framed lean-to conservatory.

The west end elevation features ground floor weatherboarding and first floor plastering, with an external stack of two builds, showing a central vertical joint and an earlier 18th-century phase. The east end elevation is timber-framed and jettied, with a 19th-century external stack, and 19th-century casement windows on both ground and first floor with 2x2 pane glazing bars. A 19th-century rear unit has ground floor brickwork with a casement window and a first floor rendered section with a 19th-century 2-light casement window featuring 2x2 pane glazing bars.

Interior

The ground floor retains a cross-passage with opposed doorways from the post-medieval refurbishment. The hall area above features a central truss with a tie-beam with arched braces to unjowled posts. The members are chamfered with elegant triangular chamfer stops. There is a crown post with an expanded head supporting a collar purlin and broach stops to the internal angles formed each side of a fillet moulding on each square face. A recess in the front wall plate marks the position of a former hall window. The roof above the central collar purlin is partly cut away, and timbers are heavily sooted.

The west, "high" end cross-wing comprises two bays with a central truss, the foot of the crown post expanded with arched braces to the tie-beam. A window shutter rebate is present at the front ground floor. The east "low" end cross-wing has a central truss of a two-bayed unit with unjowled posts and arched braces to the tie-beam, with corner posts that are jowled. The roof was originally of crown post form but has been replaced with a softwood roof of side purlin type.

Common ceiling joists on the ground floor are flat laid with centre tenons to the binding joist. The east flanking stack was rebuilt internally and probably dates from the 17th century. The central stack to the hall, likely of the same date, was constructed to avoid the central crown post and is now completely boxed in by later work. The bridging joist of the inserted attic floor is chamfered with lamb's tongue chamfer stops dating from around 1600. The west stack is of unknown origin, with a 20th-century brick wall now built on the ground floor across the fireplace position.

The Post Office forms part of a group with other buildings around the green.