Swan House

Swan House, Blackmore

A house dating from the late 14th and 17th centuries, extended in the 20th century. The building is timber-framed with pargeted brick and roofed with machine-made red clay tiles. It stands on the west side of The Green.

The main structure comprises a 17th-century range of three bays aligned north-east to south-west, with an axial stack positioned at the north-east end of the middle bay. This range stands on the site of, or possibly incorporates part of, a medieval hall house that originally had a parlour or solar wing to the north-east. At the south-west end is a late 14th-century service cross-wing of two bays, incomplete at its south-east end. It consists of one large bay to the north-west and a small bay to the south-east, which formerly contained the pantry and buttery of the medieval house. A 19th-century range runs parallel to and south-east of the main range, completing a rectangular plan with the entrance to the north-east. The building now has two parallel north-east to south-west ranges, with a gablet hip roof over the cross-wing. It is two storeys high.

The exterior features two 20th-century square bays with a continuous canopy over a 20th-century door. All windows are 20th-century casements of identical design with diamond leading. Pictorial pargeting was added in 1988, along with a band of repetitive ornament running around the first-floor level, made of unidentified material, possibly glass-reinforced plastics.

The interior has been much altered around 1984, retaining some original features while others are 20th-century reproductions or reused timber employed as decoration. The axial stack has been wholly rebuilt or re-faced with 20th-century bricks. A chamfered binding beam to the south-west of the stack features lamb's tongue stops on both sides. An axial beam with small beaded mouldings at the arrises runs unstopped to the south-west of the stack. The south-east wallplate consists of reused timber. A steeply cranked tie-beam to the north-east of the stack appears to be an introduction, though it may possibly come from the incomplete 14th-century cross-wing.

The twin service doorways are complete and original, with chamfered jambs and four-centred arched heads, the central post deeply rebated for the former doors. The studding of the former partition between the buttery and pantry has been removed. Plain joists of heavy square section, jointed to the binding beam with central tenons and left unrefined, are all original but truncated to the south-east. Beside the service doorways, three matching arches have been constructed as 20th-century reproductions of the service doorways, forming a false arcade between the cross-wing and main range, with 20th-century ornamental brick nogging above the original girt.

On the first floor, most of the timber structure is concealed by plaster, though the steeply cambered central tie-beam of the cross-wing and possibly the crownpost are present but plastered. The roof is inaccessible, but much of the cross-wing's roof has been demolished to incorporate it into the different alignment of the present roof.

The building formerly functioned as a public house called The Swan. An estate map of 1832 shows the house in an L-plan, confirming that the cross-wing formerly extended further to the south-east. A photograph from the north dated around 1900 shows the plan and roofs as they are at present, with walls of exposed brickwork, shop windows in the positions of the present bay windows, a central entrance, and on the first floor three early 19th-century sashes of six-over-six lights.