Former Granary at Headstone Manor

DATE: probably late-C18 or early C19. Adapted for use as a museum visitor centre after its relocation in 1990-91.

MATERIALS: brick ground floor with weatherboard clad soft-wood timber frame upper storeys and pitched slate roof.

PLAN: square plan with three storeys, each elevation of four bays.

EXTERIOR: the brick ground floor is laid in Flemish bond. The weatherboarding to the upper storeys is a modern replacement. Each of the upper floors has four windows on each elevation and there is an additional window in each gable. The ground floor has four windows to each side and three windows and a doorway in the gable ends. All windows are set in square-headed openings, have modern secondary glazing, and most retain their vertical iron security bars. The windows have simple timber drip boards except the uppermost row which are protected either by the overhanging eaves or the slightly projecting gables. Internally, the windows have top-hung wooden shutters. The timber door frames contain plank and batten doors with internal round-end strap hinges.

INTERIOR: the roof is supported by five softwood queen post trusses, those forming the gable wall having straight bracing below the tie beam. Other tie beams have reinforcing cast iron brackets secured with iron pegs. Most of the roofing elements and the second-floor studding and bracing are original. The second floor has been removed but the joists remain. At first floor level the principal beams are original but most of the posts have been replaced as has much of the studding and bracing. All grain chutes and bin partitions have been lost.

The ground floor beams, supported on brick piers with replacement timber wall plates, are mostly original, as are the joists, but the posts are replacements. In the northern corner is a modern timber closed string stair. Modern concrete tile floor.