Wiseman's Cottage

Wiseman's Cottage is a 17th-century timber-framed house located on High Wych Road. It was extended by one bay to the east in the 18th century and has since been subdivided. The cottage features a steep old red tile gabled roof and has a layout consisting of three rooms in line in the older part, with a door positioned opposite a large chimney stack located between the two western rooms. This arrangement allows for only an entrance and a rear passage leading to the parlour on the west side. An external winding stair, now enclosed in a modern rear wing, is accessed from this passage. The building has two storeys and a cellar, with an old plank door that has iron hinges. Inside, the parlour showcases a cross-beam and a fireplace lintel that are chamfered and stopped. An axial beam supports the floor above the cellar, which is constructed with English bond brickwork. The chimney rises to a square mass at ridge level, topped by two diagonally set square shafts. The eastern room, now part of No 54, has an axial beam and is connected to the 18th-century addition, which is two storeys tall with an attic and has a lower ground floor level. In the older western room, the posts and cross beam are exposed, along with a chamfered axial beam featuring a concave stepped stop. The chimney was built at the former eastern gable of the older house. The new house includes a winding stair in the northeast corner. The southern front has modern panelled pargetting and four windows, along with simple plank doors and three-light 19th-century wooden casement windows. The cottage has historical ties to John Rivers, who established his nursery on the land at Wiseman's in 1725.