Minchery Farmhouse

This is a 15th-century farmhouse, originally part of a dormitory range for Littlemore Priory, substantially rebuilt around 1600. It is now used as a country club. The building is constructed of limestone rubble with squared dressings, and has an old plain-tile roof with stone and brick ridge stacks. It is a single range running north-south, with a stair tower on the west side. The main west front has two storeys plus attics, and originally had five windows. The central doorway has a four-centred moulded stone arch and a stone label. To the right is a 20th-century three-light window, and beyond a 20th-century stone-mullioned window. A single light is set at an intermediate height, aligned with a stone stack; it has an ovolo-moulded surround. At the first floor, there are mullioned windows of two, three, and two lights, the window above the door retaining its original ovolo-moulded stonework. A gabled stair tower of two storeys sits to the left of the entrance, with 19th-century window openings under stone segmental arches. To the left again is a further bay with re-modelled openings and a secondary entrance. A single-bay, two-storey extension from the north gable wall is likely from the late 18th century. The east front has a row of five evenly spaced single lights at first floor, likely dating from the 15th century, with trefoil and cinquefoil heads set in concave-chamfered rectangular surrounds. A four-light mullioned window, also concave-chamfered, is located to the right. A doorway is present at ground floor, opposite the main entrance. To the left is a 15th-century window with two trefoil-headed lights, followed by a single light with a chamfered stone surround. A mutilated mullioned window with two chamfered lights is next, followed by another 15th-century window of two trefoiled-headed lights. The bay to the extreme left has 20th-century altered openings. The south gable wall, with a brick stack, was probably rebuilt in the 18th century. The interior has been altered, but retains chamfered and stop-chamfered spine beams with run-out stops, and two-stone moulded Tudor-arched fireplaces at the first floor. The early 17th-century dog-leg staircase rises to the attics and features pierced flat balusters, lantern finials, and pendants. It includes wooden three-centre arches with carved spandrels over the flights. The roof is a seven-bay structure with eight heavy queen-post trusses, each with collars clasping purlins, the top collar being cambered. Views from around 1826 show mullioned windows throughout, roughly in their present arrangement, although the west front had the remains of a stone porch and a Gothic-arched doorway to the right of the original stair window.