St Catherines

St Catherines, Botesdale

House, later converted into two dwellings. Mid-15th century, altered in the early 16th century with a stack inserted, further altered and extended from the early to mid-17th century, then altered again in the 19th and 20th centuries. Timber-framed and plastered with steeply pitched pantiled roofs.

The building was originally a double-ended hall house. All trace of the upper cross wing has disappeared, but a two-bay lower cross wing survives. The original two-bay hall with cross passage was probably partly storeyed at the lower end; a floor was inserted and the building was raised and reroofed during the 16th and 17th centuries. Three bays were added in front of the lower cross wing to form an L-shaped plan. The structure is now two storeys throughout.

The hall bays are set well back. The cross passage entrance has a blocked early 16th-century four-centred arched door surround with cavetto moulding and carved dragons in the spandrels. Above this is a small 20th-century window to the stairs inserted in the cross passage, with 20th-century two and three-light glazing bar casements. The right gable end has an external stack added to the front of the ridge.

The cross wing extending forward to the left has lower eaves and ridge. A 19th-century entrance into the 17th-century extension features a recessed half-glazed door with reeded jambs and lozenges to the panelled frieze and cornice. Flanking the door are two and three-light casements, with a four-by-eight pane architraved sash above. An axial ridge stack in the 17th-century bay nearest the original cross wing rises behind the ridge. The front gable end has a 20th-century bow window and a two-light casement. The left return has casements with a step down in the plinth indicating earlier building phases. At the rear angle on the cross wing roof is a secondary hip.

The rear elevation shows hall bays with a 17th-century stack inserted in the cross passage rising behind the ridge. To the left of the original cross entry is a half-glazed door, with French windows and two and three-light glazing bar casements nearby.

Interior: The lower cross wing has two pointed arched service doorways. On the hall side of the post between these doorways is a large mortice for a brace springing from above head height, indicating the cross wing was jettied to the front with a bracket to every third joist. The stairs were originally to the front right.

The hall is much altered and has open truss posts of rebated section with inserted chamfered jowled storey posts. The axial binding beam and mid-rail are stop-chamfered. An early screen between the hall and passage features chamfered muntins and raised panels. In the cross passage towards the front is a late 17th-century dogleg staircase with S-shaped splat balusters, partially restored, with a square newel post and moulded hand rail.

On the first floor, the cross wing retains parts of diamond-mullioned window openings and straight arched braces in the walling. It has jowled posts supporting a chamfered cambered tie beam to an open truss with an octagonal crown post, triple roll-moulded cap and base with double roll moulds on the shaft, four-way arched braces, and a bridled scarf joint in the collar purlin.

The hall chamber has some close studding and traces of corbelling on open truss posts. It was raised with straight through tension braces and 16th or 17th-century cambered tie beams. The hall roof has two large-scantling 16th-century chamfered arch-braced cambered collar trusses with unused mortices at the lower and upper end of the hall, excluding the cross passage, suggesting they were reused in a 17th-century clasped purlin roof. The 17th-century bays have an indented bar stop-chamfered axial binding beam and a single butt purlin roof with cambered collars.