Elm Farmhouse

Elm Farmhouse

House, early and mid-16th century, altered in the 19th and 20th centuries. Timber framed, comprising two blocks.

Block 1 is a mid-16th-century long-jetty house of 3 bays facing south, consisting of a parlour/solar bay to the left and a floored hall of 2 bays in the proportion 2:1, with the right service bay missing. Block 2, to the northeast, is one bay of an incomplete early 16th-century building aligned north-south and jettied to the west. Both blocks are 2 storeys.

In block 1, all ground-floor studding had been removed at the time of survey in August 1985, and the rear wall had been built up in 19th-century brick to wallplate height. The timber frame features unjowled posts, close studding with Suffolk bracing trenched to the outside, and an edge-halved and bridled scarf in the rear wallplate. The roof is a crownpost design with an original hipped gablet at the left end and a secondary hipped gablet at the right end. The moulded and crenellated bressumer is much weathered.

On the upper storey's left return are unglazed windows either side of the central storey posts; one is complete with diamond mullions and the tiebeam has shutter grooves. Evidence of other unglazed windows exists below in the rear wall and at the front in the shorter bay of the hall chamber. The longer bay has an incomplete oriel window with a deep sill, mortices in the jambs for splayed sides, grooved jambs for a vertically sliding shutter, and in the central stud below, pegholes for securing it at various heights—a detail of unusual interest. In the right end wall, the central storey post is rebated for twin service doors; a fragment of one arched head remains. A mortice in the girt indicates the position of the former stair trap against the rear wall.

The floor of the left bay comprises a chamfered axial beam with step stops and plain joists of horizontal section jointed to it with soffit tenons with diminished haunches; evidence of a former stair trap exists against the partition wall. The floor of the hall comprises a richly moulded axial beam with elaborate stops of unusual design and similar joists. The cambered tiebeam of the open truss has arched braces and is chamfered with step stops. The crownposts are plain with thin axial bracing. The original full-length rafters have gauging holes; many have been replaced. A short early 19th-century balustrade with bowed handrail and stick balusters is on the first floor.

Block 2 comprises one bay of a building which formerly extended further in both directions. The posts are jowled, the west wallplate has a slightly splayed scarf with square bridled abutments, and the close studding is trenched on the outside for Suffolk bracing. Evidence of unglazed windows exists to the west and east on both storeys; the west window above the jetty has rectangular mortices for 5 closely-spaced moulded mullions. The north wall frame has equally-spaced mortices for the studs of a former partition, but jointing for another bay beyond. The south wall frame is an open truss with no evidence of structural integration to the missing service bay of block 1.

The axial beam is chamfered and unstopped; plain joists of horizontal section, very closely spaced, meet it at an oblique angle and are housed into it with soffit tenons. No roof timbers survive above tiebeam level. The north tiebeam has a mortice for a former crown stud; the south tiebeam has mortices for deep arched braces but no evidence of a crownpost. One plain bracket survives below the north end of the jetty.

The structural features of block 2 suggest it was originally of higher status, built on another (probably urban) site in the first quarter of the sixteenth century, and reconstructed on the present site later as a minor ancillary wing behind the service bay of the long-jetty house. The building underwent renovation under listed building consent no. LB/TEN/36/84. Measured drawings by E. and B. Watkin of the Essex Historic Buildings Group have been deposited with Essex Record Office.