Gains Cottage

Gains Cottage is a house that dates back to the 16th century or earlier, with cladding from the 16th or 17th century. It features a timber frame covered with red brick in irregular header and English bond, along with weatherboarding on the first floor. The roof is plain tiled and may have originally been an aisled hall house. The building stands two storeys high on a ragstone plinth and has a hipped roof. To the right end, there is a clustered moulded and filleted stack, while the rear left has a large free-standing stack with rebuilt diamond-set flues.

On the first floor, there are two wooden casements and a glazing bar sash to the right, and on the ground floor, there are three tripartite glazing bar sashes. The central door consists of six raised and fielded panels, with the top two being glazed and featuring a segmental head. There is also a panelled door to the right end. To the left, there is a weatherboarded outshot with a boarded door on the left return, accessible by a flight of steps.

Inside, the cottage has beaded moulded and hollow chamfered doorways, particularly noticeable at the head of the newel stair in the outshot, which features a four-centred arched door with fernleaf spandrels. The area also has a stop-chamfered wall plate and boarded doors with strap hinges. The rear has ovolo moulded mullioned windows, and the upper corridor boasts moulded wainscotting. A large kitchen inglenook with an attached bake oven is present, and exposed close-studding can be seen within the entrance porch, which was originally the external wall of the hall. Most of the decorative features date back to the 16th and 17th centuries, including the stacks, and may cover the extension of an earlier building, particularly with the outshot. However, the size and nature of the internal frame suggest that this may be an adaptation of an earlier aisled hall.