Barrow Hill House, Bakehouse and Stables, West Mersea

Barrow Hill House, Bakehouse and Stables

This property comprises a house, bakehouse and stables constructed in various phases from the late 15th century onwards. The house has walls of gault brick and timber framing with a tiled roof. The bakehouse combines brick and timber framing under a tiled roof. The stables are of red brick with a metal sheet roof.

The main range of the house is a single room deep with a central stair passage. A cross wing at the eastern end projects northwards of the main range with two small extensions in the angle between them.

The south elevation is of two storeys in gault brick with stone flat arches to windows. The main range has a tall gambrel roof with end stacks and three dormers. Full-height canted bay windows stand either side of the central door, which is half glazed with margin lights and six small panels below. The door has a rendered surround and a round-headed window under a hood mould above it. The bay windows contain late 19th-century sashes. A lower hipped roof at the eastern end returns as a cross wing to the north. It has late 19th-century sash windows with margin lights, the ground floor one replaced in the early 21st century.

The western end is of red brick with a rendered single-storey lean-to store extension dating from the mid-20th century, when two small windows were also inserted in the gable. The cross wing has rendered walls to east and north sides. Both sides have a ground floor door with window beside it and a single window above. All are of late 20th-century date. The north side of the main range is rendered on a timber frame without openings, although the scar of a removed 20th-century extension can be seen. Two dormers are on the roof above. A catslide-roofed extension is in the angle between the main range and cross wing with a six-over-six sash window and a small porch on its western side. Both are rendered and probably date from between 1838 and 1874.

The bakehouse is of four bays in red brick with a pitched roof clad in mid-20th-century tiles and a chimney stack at the south end with decorative diaper work in burnt headers in the gable. Two windows with reused six-over-six sashes flank the plank and batten door on the west side with a similar door in the east wall opposite. A 20th-century replacement window is in the northern gable with a blocked doorway below.

The stables are of six bays with a stable door off centre on the west elevation flanked by lunette windows with grey brick voussoirs and cast-iron window frames. There are shuttered rectangular openings to the south at high level, possibly for taking in fodder, and at ground level. A larger lunette with cast-iron frame is in the southern gable end and a large opening has been made in the north gable end, probably in the 20th century. The east side has a single door at the south end with a lunette window with iron frame next to it and a high-level vent to the north.

Inside the cross wing there is exposed timber framing throughout suggesting a construction date of the late 15th century. The ground floor is a single open space with a bridging beam running east to west with the mortices of a former partition. In the south wall some studs have been removed for the 19th-century window. Joints in the floor joists at either end of the south wall could be associated with realignment of the wall to remove a jetty. Early 21st-century repairs replaced the sole plates on the south and east sides along with part of one floor joist in the south east corner and three in the north east which filled the opening for a stair, possibly an original secondary one or an 18th-century one. All these early 21st-century replacement timbers are reused historic ones.

The west side of the room has an 18th-century doorway from the main range and a chimney of that date. The mid-rail suggests there were original doorways at the south and north ends of the west wall. The original stair opening in the ceiling is at the north west corner, blocked with reused timbers. A blocked original window is situated in the north wall. There is another blocked window in the east wall with diamond mullion joints and a sliding shutter groove, and the doorway was formed from another window.

The first floor of the cross wing has extensive studwork and jowelled corner posts and is spanned by a tie beam with the eastern brace partly removed, probably to create a doorway through a partition in the 18th century. Above the inserted ceiling the original crown post roof is substantially intact. On the south wall of the room studs have been removed and the wall plate trimmed for the 19th-century window opening. On the east, timber diamond mullions and a sliding shutter groove are inside a 20th-century casement window while a wider space between the studs at the north end suggests a former opening, possibly to a garderobe. The north wall also has a window shutter groove but without mullions. On the west wall the plate has been cut for the doorway from the 18th-century range and studs removed for a fireplace, a cupboard with 18th-century L-hinges and access to the roof space of the 19th-century catslide extension. There are six plaster on wattle and daub infill panels with visible wall painting in red: four on the east wall with diaper patterns and one which might depict the rigging of a ship, and one on the west wall which may include animals.

In the roof space above the catslide extension some rope pattern pargetting from the formerly external wall of the cross wing survives with lines in plaster and on the wall plate indicating the roof line of the demolished hall, possibly an aisled structure. The timber framed north wall of the 18th-century range is also visible.

From the front door of the 18th-century range an entrance passage contains an open well stair with Tuscan column pendant newels and three stick balusters to each open string tread with simple scroll brackets. This decoration is carried up through all floors. The newels and handrail are reflected in carved timber mouldings on the stair walls. There is a two-panel door on L-hinges under the stair and four-panelled doors to the principal rooms, all in 18th-century doorcases.

Principal rooms flank the entrance. The western room has a fireplace flanked by arched niches in the late 18th-century Adam style. The chimneypiece has a simple mantle with dentil cornice, delicate relief scroll decoration on the architrave flanked by urns, plain sidepieces and a marble insert. The niches are set between reeded pilasters with a shallow arch below dentil cornice. A dentil cornice and dado panelling run around the whole room to the inserted late 19th-century bay window which has shutter boxes. The eastern ground floor room has dado panelling matching the western room, a plain 18th-century stone fireplace insert with simple 20th-century timber mantle, four-panelled doors in 18th-century doorcases and shutter boxes to the 19th-century bay window.

On the first floor the western room has a simple painted 18th-century chimneypiece with dentil cornice mantle and late 19th-century grate and surround which is flanked by 18th-century cupboards. Matching chimneypiece, grate and doors are in the eastern first floor room, part of which has been divided to create a bathroom in the 21st century.

At the rear of the ground floor the porch and extension dating from between 1838 and 1874 contains a traditional 19th-century timber water closet bench seat in the former and brick nogged construction and fitted late 19th-century pantry shelves.

The bakehouse is divided in two by a brick partition but has a gault brick floor throughout. The southern part contains a large hearth with a smokery chamber built under the lintel of what might have originally been a bread oven. To one side is the base of a copper. A hand-operated pump drawing water from an adjacent well is on the west wall. The roof structure is complete on the east side, with common rafters replaced on the west and evidence of a former ceiling. In the northern part of the building pegged and jointed timber framing is seen inside the brick cladding. The rest of the building is solid brick walling suggesting two phases of development from the 18th and early 19th centuries.

The stables have a concrete floor with a simple roof of mixed split and square timbers with collars and tie beams that appear to be largely intact and of one build. The second bay from the south end is narrow, with boarded partitions above the tie beams and evidence of former partitions below. This bay is accessed from a high-level opening with timber shutter in the west wall, possibly for taking in fodder. The southernmost bay has a low, ground-level shuttered opening in the west wall opposite. This may be a calf creep and the end bay a cow shed with stables at the northern end though there is no evidence of stable fittings except a timber saddle hook in the north west corner.