Harsnetts

Harsnetts is a lobby-entrance house built around 1600, with extensions added in the 18th and 19th centuries. The building is timber framed, primarily covered in roughcast render, with some weatherboarding, and has a roof made of handmade red clay tiles. It consists of four bays aligned approximately northeast to southwest, with a northwest aspect. There is an axial chimney stack located in the third bay from the northeast end, which forms the lobby entrance, and an external chimney stack at the northeast end.

A short 18th-century extension encloses the stack at the northeast, while a longer 18th-century extension is found to the southwest. There is also a single-storey extension from the 19th century beyond this. The original stair wing is located at the rear of the main stack. A long rear extension from the 19th century and a single-storey flat-roofed extension in the southern angle from the 20th century complete the structure.

The house has two storeys and features two six-panel flush doors set in simple doorcases, each with rectangular lights above that have cast iron geometrical tracery and shallow hoods, dating to around 1800. There is a two-storey canted bay with three double-hung sash windows, each with 12 lights and a pyramidal roof, also from around 1800, with some crown glass. The building includes four 20th-century reproductions of 17th-century mullioned and transomed windows with leaded lights, and one plain boarded door in the 19th-century extension.

On the first floor, the windows mirror those on the ground floor, with two additional casement windows of the same style above the doors. At the rear, there are three 18th-century windows on the first floor, each featuring one wrought iron casement and all leaded. The axial beams above the ground floor rooms are boxed in, and the building has jowled posts, with the front wallplate visible. The beams are plain-chamfered with lamb's tongue stops, and there are edge-halved and bridled scarf joints. The original newel stair features bobbin-turned balusters at the top.

The building was purchased by Archbishop Harsnett in 1627 from John Penington, likely intended as a residence for the master of the English School. The previous occupant was Alexander Stowell, a glover. The name Harsnetts was mistakenly assigned when it became a boarding house for small boys, under the belief that it had been the residence of the founder of the School.