Brackendale

Brackendale is a former guildhall that has also served as almshouses, a workhouse, and three dwellings, but is now a single dwelling. It dates from around 1510 and has been altered in the 19th and 20th centuries. The building features a timber frame that is partially exposed and is plastered with some sections of whitewashed brick casing. It has a steeply pitched pantiled roof and consists of five bays, with a narrow entrance bay originally located to the right and a four-bay first floor hall. The structure is two storeys high and has a continuously jettied front.

On the ground floor, the entrance is now to the left of centre and features 19th and 20th-century six and nine-light casements. Inside, there is a brattished girding beam and bressumer, with moulded capitals below curved brackets supporting the main joists. The first floor displays exposed studding and 20th-century casements, with three windows to the centre and left that retain large sills which originally supported oriel windows; traces of ornamental carving can still be seen. The left gable end has an external stack with offsets and exposed studding, while the right gable end is brick cased with a 19th-century extruded stack and a small lean-to outshut.

At the rear right, there is a short gabled two-storey 19th-century brick wing with segmental headed casements. Additionally, a one-storey lean-to outshut has been added to the rear centre and left. Inside, the ground floor features close studding of large scantling and crossed stop-chamfered binding beams, along with a four-centred arched doorway in the right-hand bay leading to the rear. The first floor contains two similar doorways in the right-hand bay, indicating original external stair access from the rear. The walling includes curved tension braces, and there are jowled posts with large hollow moulded arched braces leading to moulded cambered tie beams. The crown post roof features octagonal posts with moulded capitals and bases, and two-way curved braces to the collar purlin.