Poplar Farmhouse

Poplar Farmhouse is a house that was formerly a farmhouse, dating from the early 16th century, with alterations made in the 17th century and around 1980. It is a small open-hall house with a cross-wing to the right and an altered service cell to the left. The hall range has one storey with attics, while the cross-wing has two storeys. The building is timber-framed and rendered, with some parts made of clunch and painted brick. The cross-wing features 20th-century applied half-timbering. The roof is hipped and covered with double Roman pantiles, which were originally thatched. There is a rendered 17th-century chimney that has a sunk date panel, with the upper part of the shaft made of gault brick. The house has 19th and 20th-century casement windows and a panelled entrance door. Inside, the small central open hall retains its original smoke-blackened clasped-purlin roof. The two-bay cross-wing was originally composed of two cells on the ground floor and one above, featuring a central arch-braced tie-beam. The narrow cell to the left has heavy lodged floor joists and evidence of close-studding, and there was originally a small loft above within a hipped roof. This end of the house was extended in the 17th century to create a heated parlour, and a massive chimney and first floor were added to the hall. The farmhouse is included in the listing despite the 20th-century alterations because it is a rare example of a late-medieval Breckland farmhouse. Additionally, it features the unusual combination of an open hearth with a hall that has a side-purlin roof, which are two characteristics not typically found together in Suffolk.