Balhams Hall And The Cottage

Balhams Hall and The Cottage is a house, now divided into two houses, dating from the 15th century, with alterations made in the late 16th and 18th centuries. The building features a timber frame covered in roughcast and has old red tile roofs that are now hipped at the front. It is designed in an H-plan as an open-hall house with two crosswings, including a parlour wing at the north (The Cottage) and an 18th-century stair located in the rear angle of the hall and service wing at the south.

In the late 16th century, a floor was inserted, which included provisions for a smoke hood in the lower bay of the hall. A large central chimney was added at the upper end of the hall during the 17th century. The house was subdivided in the early 18th century when the front jettied projections and gables were removed, and part of the ground floor was rebuilt in brick at the south end.

The east front features four windows that are irregularly spaced on each floor, with flush sash windows having 6/6 panes above and 8/8 below. There is a six-panel door at the north end, accessed by two steps, with a flat hood supported by shaped brackets. The rear has gabled wings that project differently, adorned with panelled pargetting, and includes a large central chimney along with an 18th-century external end chimney at the south.

The entrance from the rear leads into the site of the cross passage, which has a blocked doorway to the stair and twin doorways to the buttery and pantry, featuring hollow chamfer and four-centred heads. The partition between these areas has been removed. Inside, there are heavy square joists in both crosswings, along with heavy roll-moulded beams and chamfered and stopped joists supporting the 16th-century inserted floor in the hall. A wave-moulded supporting ledge is pegged to the side walls, and the floor was designed to support a smoke hood in the lower bay, with roof collars cut away above, shutter grooves, and a mortice for diamond mullioned windows in the front and rear walls.

A surviving three-light window is located in the north wall of the south wing, overlooking the rear slope of the hall roof. The hall features a large 17th-century red brick fireplace and stack at the upper end. The roofs are constructed with crown-posts, and there are cambered tie-beams over the centre of the hall, with chamfered and stopped crown-posts and four-way curved bracing. Tension bracing is present in the framing of the south wing. The first floor includes early 18th-century two-panel doors with H-hinges and heavy moulded mantel shelves above the fireplaces.