24 And 26, Bridge Street

Pair of houses at 24 and 26 Bridge Street, Saffron Walden, originally constructed as an early 15th-century Wealden open hall house. No.24 occupies the service end and hall, while No.26 occupies the solar bay. The building was significantly altered in the late 16th century by the insertion of a floor into the hall and the addition of a rear wing to the solar bay. The structure is timber-framed and plastered, consisting of two storeys with early 20th-century pargetting and a peg-tiled roof featuring a large late 16th-century central stack behind the roof apex and a second 19th-century stack through the roof pitch at the south end. The plan is L-shaped, with a late 16th-century rear wing added to the east of the north end bay of No.26.

The west elevation shows the front of the building. The central hall area between the jettied ends is itself jettied at a slightly higher level, with a 16th-century bressumer decorated with folded leaf between twin roll mouldings. Below this is a doorway with an original flat, depressed four-centred arched head with leaf and bud decorated spandrels at the south, low end of the hall. All-over pargetting covers the front with panels containing basket, chevron and circular combed decoration. All windows are casements or sliding sashes with glazing bars.

On the ground floor of No.24, from south to north, there is a late 18th-century two-light sliding sash window of 6x3 panes with hinged 20th-century shutters on each side, a 16th-century doorway with restored boarded and battened door, a small 16th-century two-light moulded mullioned window, and a slightly projecting late 18th-century bay window on the original hall window site with a sliding sash of two lights of 6x9 panes. No.26 has a 20th-century doorway in Tudor style with four-centred arched head and boarded and battened door, adjacent to a two-light casement window of 6x3 panes. The first floor of No.24 contains, from south to north, a late 18th-century two-light sliding sash window of 6x3 panes, a 19th-century single casement of 2x2 panes, a peg-tiled gabled dormer window serving the first floor room with two casements of 6x3 panes. No.26 has a single three-light casement window of 9x6 panes.

The rear east elevation shows the principal stack in two phases with stepped sections of bricks of differing thicknesses, with rendered walls. No.24 has all 20th-century fenestration comprising irregular casements with glazing bars: on the ground floor, one two-light by three-light casement, one three-light by five-light casement, one double casement of 6x4 lights, and a fully glazed door of 3x4 lights; on the first floor, two double casements each of 6x3 lights. No.26 to the north has a full-width wing showing traces of old basket-decorated pargetting on the timber-framed and plastered first floor of its south long side, with the ground floor of 18th or 19th-century brick, all now rendered and colourwashed with a peg-tiled roof and a stack circa 1800 at the west end. The ground floor has a central 20th-century door with upper glazed panel and lower sunk panel, to the west a 20th-century three-light casement of 9x4 panes, and to the east a 20th-century two-light casement of 4x4 panes. The first floor has two 19th-century sliding sashes with bead-moulded frames: to the west the sashes are 20th-century renewals of 6x4 panes, and to the east they are original of 4x4 panes.

The east end elevation has 20th-century rendered and textured surfaces with a half-hipped gable. The ground floor has a 20th-century double casement window of 4x4 panes, and the first floor has a 20th-century top-opening single-light casement of 2x3 panes. The south end elevation, which is the side of No.24, displays medieval framing exposed with circa 1900 red brick nogging in diagonal and herringbone pattern. The frame shows tension bracing of the first floor and two blocked first floor windows, one original to the west and one inserted to the east. The projecting horns of wall plates and collar-purlin joints are visible. The ground floor has a single 20th-century hinged casement window of 2x3 panes.

Interior of No.24: The principal tie-beam of the hall is set off-centre towards the service partition and carries a tall refined decorated octagonal crown-post with moulded capital principally of hollow mouldings, a bell-moulded base, and four-way bracing. The post has an expanded head bridled round a collar-purlin and is heavily sooted. The rear of the truss has an arched brace to the tie-beam. The front of the truss was cut through for the inserted floor and first floor doorway, though the joints remain indicating the original Wealden arrangement of flying eaves plate with end-brace and bracket under the supporting tie-beam, down to the principal post of the recessed hall. The rear hall window site is indicated by a stud gap in the wall plate. The hall and service partition truss remains with tension bracing and a crown post with foot bracing and carpenters' marks. One service doorway remains with a four-centred arched head, sunk spandrels and double hollow-moulded jambs. A second doorway site is shown by a long head chase-mortice. A pantry or buttery partition central in the service bay is evident from stud mortices and a wattle groove. A halved and bridled scarf joint appears in the plate of the room above. A plain crown-post roof from the hall continues over the service bay and is covered by additional 20th-century rafters. The inserted stack is set behind and against the hall crown-post and backs onto a cross-entry from the old street door. The rear face of the thin 16th-century bricks has some courses on the ground floor set on edge to create a pattern. The ground floor fireplace has a steeply cambered mantel-beam (possibly reused) and jambs rebuilt in the 20th century. The first floor fireplace is of larger 17th-century bricks with a four-centred arched head of secondary build, constructed after the floor was inserted. The sides and back of the stack on the first floor have mortar of bricks painted in the original pink colour. The ground floor ceiling joists of the inserted floor are framed round the stack with simple chamfers. 19th-century fireplaces on both floors in the southwest corner of the house are now blocked.

Interior of No.26 (solar bay): The heavy original ground floor ceiling bridging joist is step-stop chamfered with a segment-headed fireplace circa 1800 at the north end. The first floor has an arched braced truss supporting the hall and solar partition, with a foot-braced crown-post and the old roof intact over the block. The rear wing is of independent mid-16th-century build with jowled posts. The two bays were once jettied to the south side but are now underbuilt in brick. A large kitchen stack at the west end backs onto the original building and now has a 20th-century fireplace. The rear wall plate and studding in No.26 were replaced to accommodate the kitchen stack.

The complete building demonstrates alteration phases very clearly. The mid-16th-century infilling of the hall and construction of the stack, together with the continuous decorated long jetty rear extension, were probably contemporary. A further flue was added to the principal stack in the early 17th century to provide a fireplace in the chamber over the central room. The Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England records the removal of a hollow-chamfered mullion from the original window in the south end (now blocked), which was deposited in the Saffron Walden Museum.