Dawson Cottages

Dawson Cottages comprise agricultural workers' cottages, originally a single house. The core of the building dates to the early 17th century and was refronted and extended in the later 18th century, with further window replacements around 1945.

The house is timberframed with a ground floor refronted in red brick and a first floor hung with alternating courses of plain and curved tiles. The rear and east elevations are entirely brick in Flemish bond. It has a steeply pitched hipped roof now clad in early 20th-century tiles, with a central brick chimneystack and an additional brick external chimneystack to the north. The two-storey west elevation features three windows. The windows are largely mid-20th century metal-framed casements. The original plan likely featured a lobby entrance.

The west or entrance front has a brick modillion cornice. Most windows are set within 18th-century surrounds, cambered to the ground floor except for the right-hand ground floor window. The original entrance was likely in line with the chimney but is now blocked. A mid-19th-century gabled porch with a tiled roof, wooden supports, and a brick lower wall is on the left side. The south elevation has one window and two doorcases, one a mid-20th-century porch. The east elevation features a gabled dormer, ground floor windows with cambered head linings, and a plinth. The north elevation displays an 18th-century external chimneystack in Sussex bond brickwork.

The central ground floor room retains a spine beam with a one-inch chamfer and lambs tongue stops, along with exposed floor joists. The northern room features a spine beam, square floor joists, and a winder staircase with a plank door to the east. A mid-20th-century brick fireplace is inserted into a wider 18th-century opening. The southern ground floor room has no visible framing and a mid-20th-century brick fireplace, although the original 17th-century chimneystack adjoins and likely formerly contained a wide open fireplace. A winder staircase with a plank door is situated at the southern end of the property. The first floor showcases boxed-in beams in the northern and central rooms, a 19th-century wooden fireplace with a cast iron firegrate in the northern room, and old elm floorboards in the central room. Limited wall frame is visible on the first floor, but the wallplate likely remains embedded within the wall. The original roof structure is intact, featuring queenposts, purlins, and original rafters with an inserted ridgepiece. Additional timbers were added later for strengthening, and the roof was extended outwards in the 18th century with the addition of further rafters.

A building with the same footprint is depicted on the 1640 Montagne map and the 1841 Tithe Map. The cottages were purchased from the Birtley estate in 1945.

The cottages represent a substantially intact early 17th-century timberframed house retaining significant original fabric concealed behind a later, attractive refronting.