Old Town House And Old Town Cottage

Old Town House and Old Town Cottage, Church Road, Lingfield

This is a subdivided house in which the north part, now known as Old Town Cottage, dates from the late 16th century with 17th-century alterations and extensions, and was partly underbuilt around 1800. The south part of Old Town House was formerly the village stores and was rebuilt following a fire in 1908 by the architect Leonard Stokes in Vernacular Revival style, with the builder JJ Williams.

The buildings form an L-shaped plan. Old Town Cottage and the north wing of Old Town House are timber-framed with the upper floors clad in tile-hanging and the ground floor underbuilt in brick. Both have tiled roofs with brick chimneysstacks, one corbelled. The south part of Old Town House is also timber-framed with plastered infill on a stone plinth and has a tiled roof with brick chimneystack.

The north wing of Old Town House dates from the late 16th century. Its north side features a large attic gable projecting on a moulded bressumer with brackets bearing cushion and spike pendants. A 16th-century five-light mullioned and transomed window with leaded lights and moulded base is supported on squat scrolled brackets. Another first-floor window has been blocked externally but remains visible internally. The ground floor is built in circa 1800 Flemish bond brickwork with a triple mullioned window and doorcase. The east return has a tile-hung gable with triple mullioned first-floor windows and an early 20th-century shop front of three panels of eight panes. The remainder of the east side dates from circa 1908. The upper floor shows close-studding and two gabled dormers with four-light windows with leaded lights and herringbone-pattern infill. The moulded bressumer overhangs the ground floor, which has further close-studding with a midrail, and at the northern end is a full-height multipane former shopfront and former doorcase that retains a leaded flat hood but was converted into a window in the 1960s. At the south end is a casement window wrapping around the south-east corner. The south front has a large gable with close-studding and four ogee braces. The upper floor contains a four-light casement window. The first floor has a moulded bressumer overhanging the ground floor and a left-side doorcase with traceried rectangular fanlight and half-glazed door. The west elevation has a timber-framed gable at the north end with box framing and two curved braces, a three-light casement to the first floor and a three-light mullioned and transomed casement to the ground floor. Adjoining to the south is a flat-roofed tile-hung dormer and catslide roof to the ground floor, which is of brick in Flemish bond with one casement window and a rear door.

Old Town Cottage is attached to the north-east. Its north side is tile-hung with a gable to the west, and the ground floor is of mixed brickwork and stone with 20th-century triple mullioned or mullioned and transomed casements with leaded lights. The south side is of similar materials.

The interior of Old Town House is entered from the south side into a hall containing an early 20th-century staircase with solid panels and square newel post, though earlier stick balusters may remain underneath. The south-western ground-floor room retains the original early 20th-century wooden shutters to the shopfront. The fireplace, early 20th-century with eared architraves and swag frieze, was introduced circa 1963 when the ground floor ceased to be a shop. The north-east room has a chamfered dragon beam and diagonal floor joists from the original jetties. The north-west room has a chamfered spine beam and floor joists with lamb's-tongue stops. Mortice holes in an axial beam provide evidence for a former internal partition. Upstairs, two north rooms have exposed timber-framing, and the north-east room has a blocked three-light mullioned window. The interior of Old Town Cottage was not inspected.

Old Town Cottage and the north wing of Old Town House date from the late 16th century. By the turn of the 20th century, the south part of Old Town House was a grocery, provisions, wine and spirit store. Old photographs show that the south part had a projecting M-shaped tile-hung gable with a shopfront below, and the south end was recessed with a canted bay window on the ground floor. On the early morning of Sunday 22 March 1908, a fire broke out in the shop, caused by an overturned lamp. The Lingfield Fire Brigade managed to save the adjoining cottage to the north, but the south part of the building was severely damaged. The architect Leonard Stokes submitted plans on behalf of the brewery owners in July 1908 to Godstone Rural District for the proposed rebuilding of the stores. The East Grinstead Observer of 12 September 1908 reported that the Old Town Stores "are to be rebuilt entirely in the olden style to correspond with the surrounding architecture of this picturesque part of the village". The building was not rebuilt as a facsimile of the original. The south part was now set back behind the 16th-century north gable, and the whole of its west front was aligned with ornamental timber framing featuring ogee braces, moulded bressumer, two small gables and purpose-built shopfronts. In 1963 the shop ceased trading, and as the ground floor of the south part became residential, the original shop doorway north of the shopfront was converted into a window.