Freston Tower is a Grade II* listed building in the Babergh local planning authority area, England. First listed on 22 February 1955. A Tudor Tower.
Freston Tower
- WRENN ID
- south-steeple-thistle
- Grade
- II*
- Local Planning Authority
- Babergh
- Constituency
- South Suffolk MP: James Cartlidge (Con)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 22 February 1955
- Type
- Tower
- Period
- Tudor
- OS grid reference
- TM 177 396
- Coordinates
- 52.01265, 1.17235
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
Freston Tower is a look-out tower built around 1550, possibly for the Latymer family of Ipswich. It is constructed of orange brick with blue brick diapering and stands six storeys tall, measuring 10 by 12 feet, with a polygonal staircase turret facing the river. There is a later door at the rear that was originally set in a gabled porch.
The tower features polygonal angle buttresses topped with pinnacles, and string courses at the first, third, and sixth floors. It has an open-arcaded parapet and double-chamfered three-light mullion windows that were once rendered to look like stone, complete with moulded brick pediments on the upper floors. The sixth floor has mullion and transom windows, and each face of the stair turret has a double-chamfered light, topped by a panelled parapet. The interior includes a timber newel spiral stair. This tower is believed to have served as a look-out for an Ipswich merchant and offers a commanding view of the River Orwell.
Local climate
Freston Tower sits in a drier-than-average part of the UK, with an average of 730 mm of rain a year. This makes it drier than 80% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 66% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 14 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 87% of listed buildings. Of these, 7 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
More on this building
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- No EPC on record for this property
- Sale history — 1 transaction since 1997
- No related consent applications matched
- Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
- Flood risk assessment
- Radon risk assessment
- Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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