Randalls House

Randalls House, Colemans Moor Road, Woodley

A house probably dating from the 17th century with later extensions, partially refronted in the 18th or early 19th century. Later 20th-century extensions are not of special architectural interest.

The building comprises a timber-framed structure with brick infill; the south wall was rebuilt in brick. The roof is covered in plain tiles.

The core of the house is a three-bay, two-storey structure with a stack positioned between the middle and western bays. The original plan form is uncertain, though it may have been a two-bay lobby-entry house with the eastern bay serving as storage space. A lean-to extension was added to the west during the 19th century when the western bay was converted into a separate dwelling. Modern extensions have been built to the east and west, and a conservatory has been added to the south.

The north-facing front elevation is faced in brick at ground-floor level with a central doorway beneath a modern porch. The first floor is framed in square panels, one incorporating an arched brace. The gabled east end retains timber framing to its full height, though this is partly obscured by a single-storey modern extension. The south elevation is entirely brick, featuring a modern conservatory and roof dormers. The west end has a single-storey lean-to extension connected to a larger modern extension, with framing exposed in the gable above. The roof is gabled to the east and half-hipped to the west, with a T-shaped brick ridge stack between the middle and western bays.

Internally, the middle ground-floor bay, once presumably the parlour, preserves a high-quality ceiling structure comprising a heavy longitudinal beam and transverse joists, all featuring stopped chamfers. The ceilings in the outer bays are heavily altered and of less substantial construction. In the eastern bay, a trimmer beam defines a now-blocked aperture, which may once have provided ladder access to a first-floor storage area. The middle and western bays each contain large brick hearths set back-to-back, with the hearth in the middle bay showing vestiges of a bread oven. A modern staircase occupies the passage to the rear of the stack, beneath which the structure of an older stair remains visible. The roof structure, exposed at first-floor and attic level, features clasped purlins and curved wind braces. A tie-beam between the middle and western bays has been cut through to create a doorway, with a reinforcing beam inserted above. Original rafters survive in the attic space behind modern reinforcements; the truss between the middle and eastern bays retains part of a wattle and daub partition.

The early history of Randalls House is unknown, but its present form suggests a 17th-century origin with various subsequent phases of alteration. The western two bays may originally have formed a small lobby-entry house, with the eastern bay—unheated and originally partitioned off to roof level—used for storage. Later, in the 18th or early 19th century, the rear wall and the front wall at ground-floor level were rebuilt in brick, with the position of the door possibly changing at this time. By the late 19th century, the western bay had become a separate dwelling, with a lean-to extension built onto the end wall. In the 1990s, the building, reunited as a single property, received further extensions to the east and west and a small porch over the front entrance. A conservatory was added to the south in 2010.

The building is designated for its early fabric: a substantial portion of the timber-framed core still survives.