Numbers 77 And 77A And Walls

Numbers 77 and 77A comprise a house dating to the late medieval period with significant alterations in the 19th century. The building is timber-framed and rendered, with red/brown Flemish bond brickwork to the flanks and rear. The roofs are covered in plain tiles. It is two storeys high, with a cellar. The plan is based on two unarticulated cross-wings, the southern wing extended to the rear in the 19th century. The front gables have curiously shaped bargeboards and a relatively low pitch. The first floor features four 3-light casement windows, mostly 19th century and of varied design, all with leaded lights. The ground floor has two canted bay windows constructed of painted brick with small-paned double-hung sashes. A doorcase with a convex moulded architrave, cornice, and a 6-panel door flanked by narrow glazed sidelights sits between the bays; six stone steps with wrought-iron handrails lead to the entrance. A 19th-century mullioned and transomed 3-light casement window is located on the ground floor of the northern wing. The southern flank has a stack and windows with small-paned casements and double-hung sashes. The northern flank has a stack with two short diagonal shafts, also dating to the 19th century. The southern wing projects to the rear with a gable-end stack featuring two diagonal shafts. The rear elevation is red/brown brick and includes a tall rebuilt stack of three diagonal shafts, casement windows and blind panels with narrow projecting brick frames. A single-storey, slate-roofed extension is situated to the rear of the projecting southern wing, and a 20th-century conservatory is located behind the northern wing. Internally, the centre of the building contains a moulded spine beam and bridging joist with broad chamfer stops, indicative of a former hall. On the first floor, in the same area, are two chamfered bridging joists to a former floored attic. The northern wing features jowled posts, exposed on the first floor, of a wider cross-wing, likely dating to the 16th century, with splayed, halved and bridled scarf joint in the top plate. The ground floor of this wing has a lowered floor level and is accessed by a short, early 19th-century curved staircase with turned balusters, a wreathed hardwood handrail, and shaped tread ends. A large stack in the rear wall of the former hall is probably 17th century, with a leaded light casement with an iron frame illuminating a rear corridor on the first floor. The cellar has walls of rubble and brick. A high red brick boundary wall runs along part of the High Street frontage, curving around to the southwest where a garden gate is located. The north and east boundaries are defined by high flint and brick walls, partly rebuilt at the house end of the northern wall, and with a yard entrance at its western end.