The Old Workhouse

THE OLD WORKHOUSE

House divided into three tenanted cottages, probably dating from the late 16th or early 17th century. The building was thoroughly restored and replanned internally when purchased and repaired by the Borough Council in the 1950s and converted to public housing.

The structure uses close-studded timber frame construction, with the rear wall rebuilt in brick and the right end wall underbuilt in brick at ground floor level, the first floor tile-hung. The roof is covered in peg tiles with brick stacks.

The house faces north onto the High Street with an asymmetrical frontage of five bays including the porch, positioned left of centre. The present arrangement following the 1950s conversion has a left end stack and an axial central stack. Old photographs show an internal right end stack and what appears to be a simple chimneyspot on the ridge in an axial position. New partitions and stairs have been introduced and at least one old partition removed. In addition to the principal doorway serving No 2, there are 20th-century doorways to No 1 (alongside the porch to the left) and to No 3 (at the extreme right end of the range).

Externally, the building presents a very striking appearance with two storeys and attics. The roof is hipped at the left end and half-hipped at the right. The axial stack has a 20th-century brick shaft with a corbelled cornice, while the projecting left end stack features tile-hung set-offs and a corbelled cornice. The porch is two storeys with a gabled projecting form to the left of centre, containing a first floor coved oriel window with a pent roof. This window is glazed with a repaired four-light transomed mullioned window with single transomed lights to the returns, all glazed with leaded panes. The porch has a square-headed outer doorframe and a moulded inner doorframe, with a three-light casement in the porch gable. To the left of the porch is a two-storey bay on sandstone footings, the first floor featuring a five-light transomed mullioned window, probably largely of 17th-century date, whilst the ground floor window is of 19th or 20th-century origin with four lights, mullioned and transomed. To the right of the porch are 19th or 20th-century four-light mullioned and transomed windows glazed with leaded panes. The first floor contains three 20th-century gabled dormers with mullioned and transomed windows glazed with leaded panes. Earlier 19th-century photographs show smaller, more irregular windows to the right of the porch, including a third first floor window, and only two gabled dormers, whilst the earliest 19th-century photograph shows stone coping on the roof to the right of the porch. Most of the studs in the wall framing are renewed. The 1950s alterations have made it very difficult to decipher the original internal plan.

Interior features are much altered. Chamfered crossbeams survive on the ground floor and at least one crosswall immediately left of the porch appears to be original. The left end fireplace is largely rebuilt, with no original exposed fireplaces to the axial stack.

The roof is inaccessible in Nos 1 and 2. In No 3 it is largely concealed but appears to be a side purlin roof.

The preservation of the external features of the building and internal conversion were clearly the priorities during the 1950s restoration. A very handsome and prominently sited house.