Manor Cottage

Manor Cottage is a former farmhouse of late medieval date, probably mid to late 15th century, with substantial late 16th and early 17th century improvements, later refurbished and modernised in the mid 20th century. It is timber-framed, with the external walls at ground floor level underbuilt in 20th century Flemish bond red brick with dentil cornice, and the framing above hung with peg-tile. The main brick stack stands on a coursed sandstone base with a staggered brick chimneyshaft. The roof is covered in peg-tile.

The house is a three-room-plan structure facing west. Originally, it was a late medieval open hall house with a three-room-and-through-passage plan, featuring storeyed ends on either side of a central hall that was open to the roof and heated by an open hearth fire. The service end at the right (southern) end was originally divided into two rooms by a central axial partition, serving as buttery, dairy, pantry and similar spaces. The principal bedchamber or solar was located over the left end inner room.

During the major late 16th and early 17th century modernisation, the hall was floored over and the house was reoriented. An axial stack serving back-to-back fireplaces was inserted into the passage with a lobby entrance in front of it. The service partition was removed and this end became the parlour. The former inner room was relegated to service use.

The building is two storeys with attic rooms in the roofspace. Various single and two-storey additions have been made to the rear, mostly serving as service rooms. The kitchen is located rear left with a disused stack, and there is also a sitting room rear right.

The exterior largely reflects the 20th century modernisation. The front, facing west, has a regular though asymmetrical arrangement of four windows with 20th century casements featuring diamond panes of leaded glass. The original front doorway and what is probably a later lobby entrance doorway were positioned right of centre, though the original is now blocked by a window. The present main doorway gives access to the rear extensions. The tall, steeply-pitched roof is hipped to the left and gable-ended to the right. Similar windows appear around the other elevations, including on the extensions.

The interior of the main block contains extensive remains of the late medieval hall house. Large-framed walls are exposed at first floor level and unusually survive down to the sill on the rear wall, with timbers of large scantling featuring curving tension braces. Both end rooms contain large axial joists; empty mortises in the central joist of the right room testify to its original division into two service rooms. Much of the upper (left) end crosswall has been removed at ground floor level, but the moulded dais beam with brattished crest remains. The late medieval roof is of four bays, with an open truss in the hall and closed trusses at each end. All three trusses, including the closed trusses, have massive arch braces to the tie beam, though these have been removed from the open truss. The hall open truss has a square-section crown post with chamfered and step-stopped edges, chamfered cap and base. Common rafter A-frame trusses of large scantling feature lap-jointed collars. The hall was floored in the late 16th or early 17th century; the axial beam and joists are chamfered with step stops. The contemporary stack served the hall with a good large sandstone fireplace with a chamfered oak lintel. The fireplace behind it must have been rebuilt if one existed here in the late 16th or early 17th century.

Manor Cottage is a well-preserved late medieval hall house with significant late 16th and early 17th century improvements.