Old Leigh Place

Old Leigh Place is a farmhouse dating from the 16th century. It is timber-framed with painted brick infilling, and has a rendered brick gable end. The roof is covered in plain tiles. The house originally had four timber-framed bays. It has two storeys and a rendered plinth. A continuous jetty is carried on solid-spandrel brackets, returned to the left and formerly to the right, on a moulded dragon post. The framing is broadly-spaced with ogee tension braces. The steeply-pitched hipped roof has gablets. A multiflue brick stack is located on the front slope of the roof, towards the right end of the left-central bay. The windows are irregular, with five leaded casements: one two-light window to the left end bay, one two-light window above the doorway, a pair of two-light casements to the right-central bay, and a single-light window to the right end bay. Pegged cills are present on the second, third and fifth from left windows, and on the ground-floor windows of the left end and right-central bays. The front door is ribbed, with a renewed four-centred-arched head with hollow spandrels, located to the left end of the left-central bay. A single-storey painted brick addition with a plain tile roof extends to the rear on the left side. A two-storey rear addition is located to the right. The interior was only partly inspected. Exposed framing is present. In the left end bay are broad, close-set joists morticed for an axial partition. An enclosed staircase rises parallel to the rear wall of this bay. A cross-passage is located to the left end of the left-central bay, with four-centred-arched doorheads towards the centre of the left partition wall, and a plain staircase doorway. A brick stack in English bond backs on to the cross-passage and abuts the front wall of the house; a cross beam is located to the right side of the stack. A chamfered axial beam and joists are in the right-central bay, and a cross beam to the right end of the bay is morticed for a continuous partition with a doorway towards the front end. A shutter groove is present in a blocked front window of the left end bay.