Wildage

Wildage is a farmhouse dating from the mid-16th century, with alterations from the 17th and 18th centuries and restoration work in the 1950s. It is timber framed, with the ground floor rendered and the first floor tile-hung. The roof is tiled and hipped, featuring a multiple brick ridge stack towards the left end. The main range has four timber-framed bays, including an open hall of one bay, a short smoke bay to the left, and storeyed end bays. A short addition, likely from the 18th century or later, extends to the right. The building sits on a high knapped flint plinth.

The fenestration is irregular, with three leaded casements: one two-light window towards each end, and a three-light window to the right of the stack. There is a half-glazed door with a bracketed, plain tile canopy under the stack, and another half-glazed door to the right end. Lean-to additions are present at each end. A two-storey rear wing, built in the 1950s using matching materials, extends to the left.

Inside, the left end bay has replaced axial joists. The right end bay retains broadly-spaced studding with plaster infilling and an arch-braced tie-beam on the first floor of a partition, with evidence of an earlier partition’s continuation above and below the tie beam. Evidence of a wattle-and-daub partition, sooted on the left side, remains above the collar in the smoke bay, and mortices indicate a similar partition’s presence below the tie beam. The roof is a clasped-purlin structure with diminishing principal rafters; the left end bay and smoke bay are sooted. Mortices and shutter grooves indicate the former presence of diamond mullion windows, including a three-light window to the front of the smoke bay, a four-light window to the former right gable end on the ground floor, a four-light window to the left gable end, and an eight-light window to the rear of the open hall on the first floor. A chamfered axial beam and joists feature in the inserted hall floor, with the joists being of a smaller scantling than those in the right end bay. Also present are a brick fireplace with a wooden bressumer, likely dating to the 17th century, to the right of the stack, a blocked fireplace to the left, and two small brick fireplaces with chamfered bressumers on the first floor. A shaped and slightly enriched bracket is located at the left end of the first floor. The later right addition has later joists. Evidence suggests a later staircase was installed behind the stack. The combination of an open hall, smoke bay and clasped-purlin roof is relatively unusual for the area.