40, Castle Street

40 Castle Street is a house located in Saffron Walden, dating from the 18th century and earlier, with alterations made in the early 19th century. The building is timber-framed and plastered, featuring brick and flint cobble walling, and has a peg-tiled roof. It has a rectangular plan with a minor rear ground floor wing and a conservatory at the west end. The house is two stories high, with cellars and attics.

The front, or north elevation, is made of red brick with some burnt headers and consists of three bays. There is a central doorway flanked by giant end pilasters with moulded heads, which are cement rendered to match a plain entablature. A slightly off-centre red brick stack is located to the east, with another stack at the west end of the roof ridge. The windows are slightly segment-headed, featuring rendered voussoirs, plain reveals, and moulded frames with sashes that have glazing bars arranged in a 3x4 pane configuration. The cellar arch to the east of the doorway is boarded over, while to the west there are simple air-bricks. The doorway is approached by steps and has a restrained wooden doorcase with reeded jambs and a flat hood. The reveals have recessed panels, and the door itself consists of six panels, with the upper two being glazed.

On the rear, or south elevation, there is a noticeable central break in construction. To the west, the wall is timber-framed, while to the east, there is lower flint cobbling and upper brickwork, all of which has been colourwashed. On the ground floor to the east, there is a sliding sash window that is segment-headed with glazing bars arranged in a 2x4 pane configuration, along with a trap door to the cellar below. To the west, there is a doorway with a door that has upper glazing in a 2x2 pane configuration and two lower panels. There is a 19th-century lean-to with a corrugated asbestos roof and a small stack on the east side, adjacent to a 19th-century casement window with 2x2 panes. There is also a two-light casement window on the south side with 4x3 panes. The conservatory has a brick base and large casement windows with a plastic roof.

On the first floor, there is a single window to the east of the centre, similar to the one below. There are three flat-roofed dormer windows, featuring simple two-light casements with glazing bars, with the outer ones having 2x2 panes and the centre having 4x2 panes. The interior has a central passage with the principal stack protruding into it, suggesting that the house was rebuilt with additions to an earlier structure.