St Osyth's Priory: West Barn and Baliffs Cottage

St Osyth's Priory West Barn and Bailiffs Cottage is a building dating back to the 16th century and earlier, incorporating fabric from the monastic period, and remodelled in the 16th and 19th centuries. The northern third of the structure was converted into Bailiffs Cottage in the 19th century.

The building is constructed of medieval and later limestone and septaria rubble walls, laid randomly and coursed, with red-brick repairs and tile covering the barn roof. It is a linear range.

The exterior walls are thick, with deep reveals to varying window openings. The east-facing front elevation features a stone band at the first floor level, an ashlar doorway with a stone hood, three sash windows and single lights, some with stone surrounds and others with brick. The west-facing rear elevation of the barn has a partial plinth and partial first-floor stone band, but is irregularly arranged with numerous window openings, including doors to the first floor and later, inconsistent brick patching to earlier fabric. The south elevation has a blocked window with a limestone surround and much reused stone in the main body of the wall. The elevations of the Bailiffs Cottage are largely obscured by plastic sheeting. However, the List description notes it as a one-storey-with-attic building with a restored red-brick chimney stack to the rear, buttresses to the elevations, and three gabled dormers with small paned casements.

Inside the barn, the east wall has consistently coursed stonework, indicating the exterior has been randomly faced with stone and septaria. The windows have four-centred arched openings and deep reveals; the west elevation has single, splayed windows. A four-centred arched door with a segmented brick head leads to the second room, where deeply chamfered transverse, bridging beams and 19th-century stable partitions are visible. The barn has a largely 19th-century exposed principal rafter roof with purlins, tie beams, and raking shores.

The Bailiffs Cottage has substantial, chamfered bridging beams with run-out stops to the floor frame throughout the ground floor. The east and north entrances are 19th-century additions, and there are some 19th-century fireplaces. A main staircase leads to the first floor, where early masonry fabric and timber framing are exposed. The pegged, scissor-brace roof is predominantly 13th century, with some replaced timber elements. Wide floorboards and a fireplace dating to the late 18th or early 19th century are also present. On the ground floor, in a separate bay to the south of the more formal rooms, early fabric and a blocked, arched doorway at the east elevation are exposed internally and externally. The hayloft on the first floor was not inspected.