Houghtons

House. Dating from the 16th century, Houghtons has undergone several extensions and alterations across the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, and was converted to residential use in the 20th century. It is an irregular timber-framed building facing north, with a renewed red brick ground floor. The upper floor has plaster infill between exposed timbers. The steeply pitched roof is covered in old red tiles and gabled. The north range is the oldest part, with the western portion originally a single storey and now serving as the entrance hall. The eastern part features a lower ceiling displaying exposed joists, chamfered crossbeams, axial beams, and a lateral chimney at the junction with a 17th-century rear wing, now the kitchen. This wing has a tumbled brick gable parapet on the south side. The southwest wing, dating from the early 18th century, is timber-framed with an axial beam and an external gable chimney. It contains an 18th-century staircase with barley-sugar twisted balusters, two-panel doors, one with ovolo moulding and HL hinges, and a complete three-light mullioned window used as a borrowed light to a closet above the stair, retaining its original plate casement and leaded glazing. A 19th-century extension to the southwest has plastered walls and a low-pitched tiled roof. A single-storey flint and brick bakery adjoins to the west, with an oven incorporated into a fireplace. A two-storey timber-framed granary, now part of the house, is attached to the southwest. Cross beams are exposed within the bakery. A fine mid-18th-century corner cupboard is located in the northeast corner of the ground floor, featuring a half-dome, shaped shelves, fretted dado, and arched and coved cornice. A deep 16th-century moulded fireplace beam has been re-used in the entrance hall. The name "Houghtons" refers to its former use as a shop, "Houghton, grocer and draper," in the early 20th century, as evidenced by a photograph in the house. An 18th or 19th-century pump is fixed to the rear wall.