7, 8 AND 9, THE WALKS

Nos 7, 8 and 9 The Walks

Three cottages, probably built as one house originally. Late 17th or early 18th century with 19th century alterations. Flemish bond brick with decorative burnt headers on the front. The rear wall is coursed sandstone up to first floor level and brick above. Brick stacks and chimneyshafts. Peg-tile roof.

The cottages face south, numbered 7 to 9 from left to right. No 9 is now incorporated into The Crown adjoining to the right. All are one-room plan cottages, but there is a fourth room between Nos 8 and 9 divided by an axial wall, with the front room belonging to No 8 and the rear part now belonging to No 9. An axial stack between Nos 7 and 8 serves back-to-back fireplaces. The end stack of No 9 appears to be a secondary insertion and the ground floor is divided by an axial wall.

Inconsistencies in the layout, such as flying freeholds, suggest the building was originally a single house. The proposed layout of the late 17th or early 18th century house is a 3-room-and-through-passage plan. No 7 occupies the putative parlour, No 8 the putative hall or kitchen, the shared room the putative passage, and No 9 the putative service end room. In the later 18th century or 19th century the house was divided up into cottages. The rear outshots may date from this time.

Two storeys with attics in the roofspace and lean-to outshots to the rear of Nos 7 and 8.

The exterior has a regular 4-window front. The ground floor window right of centre is a 20th century canted bay window with glazing bars. Other ground floor windows have low segmental brick arches over them. All the front windows are probably late 18th or 19th century casements, those on the ground floor containing rectangular panes of leaded glass while those on the first floor and the dormers contain diamond panes of leaded glass. All three front doorways contain 19th century 4-panel doors under shallow flat hoods on shaped timber brackets. Above the right ground floor window of No 9 there is a sandstone sundial plaque with Roman numerals (it has no arm). The roof is gable-ended.

To the rear of Nos 7 and 8 the roof is carried down over the outshots and contains two relatively large hip-roofed dormers. These, like most of the rear windows, are late 18th or 19th century casements containing diamond panes of leaded glass. The outshot walls are coursed stone ashlar. The back wall of No 9 is coursed stone ashlar up to first floor level and tile-hung timber framing above. The two first floor windows are late 17th or early 18th century 2-light windows containing diamond panes of old glass, some green-tinged. The left one has an iron casement with ornamental wrought iron catch.

The interior mostly shows plain carpentry detail where exposed. Most ground floor rooms have plain axial beams except for the joists of the putative passage which are chamfered with step stops. First floor rooms have chamfered axial beams, a couple of them with step stops. The roof, where it can be seen, consists of tie-beam trusses with staggered butt purlins. Both fireplaces of the axial stack have been somewhat altered. There is an old, possibly original, winder stair in front of the axial stack, now used by No 8. Old plain joinery including plank doors exists in all three cottages.

Nos 7, 8 and 9 The Walks appear to have been built as a single house in the late 17th or early 18th century. There seem to have been only large houses around Groombridge Green, all built in the 17th and early 18th centuries. This is an interesting development associated with nearby Groombridge Place, itself rebuilt circa 1660 to 1670. The cottages form part of what is probably the most unspoilt group of listed buildings in Kent.