North Elham Farmhouse

This is an early 17th-century farmhouse, with later facade and alteration work. It is timber-framed, with a ground floor of red brick, and a tile-hung first floor. The front gable end of the left cross-wing is brick-built on the ground floor in a Sussex-type bond, and above in a Flemish bond. The left return side is likely tile-hung over brick. The roof is tiled. The main range, facing east, consists of two timber-framed bays built at right angles to the road. A single-bay rear return wing was added in the later 17th or 18th century to the right. The left (south) end was rebuilt in the early 19th century as a cross-wing projecting slightly to the front and rear, though incorporating a fragment of earlier timber framing in the right wall.

The left cross-wing has higher eaves and a hipped roof to both the front and rear. The main range has a hipped roof to the right, with a gablet. The rear right wing has a half-hipped roof and 1½ storeys. Two brick stacks are present: one in the front slope of the roof towards the left end of the main range, and another to the rear, at the junction of the rear wing and main range. The fenestration is irregular, with a recessed twelve-pane sash window in the front gable end of the left cross-wing, a pair of four-pane sashes with a central mullion in the centre of the main range, and a four-pane sash window towards the right end. A boarded door is located to the right of centre of the main range. There are lean-to additions to the right end of the main range and to the long left side of the rear right wing. One lean-to to the right side of the wing has partly chalk-lump walls. A red and grey brick rear lean-to is located to the left end of the main range, with a half-glazed door beneath the stack.

The interior retains exposed timber framing. A chamfered cross beam and tenoned axial beam are visible in the right side of the principal ground-floor room. A partition wall featuring thin studs and lacing-pieces, with three panels to the storey, is located at the right end of the room. The right end ground-floor room has chamfered axial beams and joists, and a door with twelve moulded panels to the right gable end. Other features include gunstock-jowled posts, a tie-beam with a partition positioned beneath it above the cross beam of the principal ground-floor room, and an exposed rear wall in the main range. An inglenook fireplace with a chamfered bressumer is located at the left end of the principal ground floor room, with a smaller brick fireplace with an angled back above on the first floor. The rear right wing has a brick inglenook with a bressumer on the ground floor. The left cross-wing features a reeded window architrave with paterae, panelled shutters, a similar doorway, and stick balusters. The farmhouse was formerly known as Parsonage Farm.