1, Church Street

No. 1 Church Street is a house, likely dating from the late 15th to early 16th century, with later 19th and 20th-century alterations. It originally included a bootmaker's shop. The structure is timber-framed, with the ground floor largely underbuilt with white-washed 19th-century brick, while the first floor is clad in painted weatherboarding. Brick stacks and chimney shafts are present, and the roof is covered in peg tiles.

The house was originally built along the street with a two-room plan, facing west. Both rooms have rear lateral stacks, with the room to the north being smaller. A 20th-century axial partition divides the interior, accompanied by a projecting end stack. A winder staircase rises from a rear outshot alongside the stack of the right-hand room. It is believed that the original house extended further to the south, being a continuous jetty house. The left room served as the hall and was floored from the start, and the stack within may be original. The function of the right room – whether an inner-room parlour or a service end room – remains unclear.

The building has two storeys, with later lean-to outshots extending across the back. The front elevation features a two-window arrangement. The first floor has 20th-century casement windows with glazing bars. On the ground floor, a 19th-century shop front is divided by timber pilasters with moulded capitals, topped by a continuous fascia with fluted brackets and a moulded entablature. A blocked doorway is on the right, and a 20th-century panelled door is on the left, with shop windows and glazing bars to either side. The roof is steeply pitched; hipped to the right and gable-ended to the left. A rear gable extends over the outshots. The front brick wall is built below the original jetty, returning round the right end but not extending to the back. The rear section retains a jetty, with the curving ends of the joists visible.

The interior is well-preserved, particularly on the first floor, where original framing is visible on the external walls and crosswall. The timber framing is large, with substantial curving tension braces. The ceiling of the ground floor room on the right is supported by a plain axial beam with a dragon beam towards the front. The crosswall is plastered at this level. The left room, or hall, has a chamfered axial beam with run-out stops. Both rooms have joists of heavy scantling. Though the front wall has been repositioned slightly, the headbeam of the original front ground floor room remains, its soffit boarded to conceal evidence of the original windows and doorways. Both fireplaces are blocked. The roof consists of two uneven bays with a closed truss between, constructed as a crown post roof, although the structure itself is obscured. The base of the crown post and down braces are visible.

No. 1 Church Street is a significant building, considered to be among the oldest surviving structures in the centre of Hadlow. It is an attractive building and contributes to a wider group of listed buildings.