The Old Vicarage

The Old Vicarage

This building on Vicarage Lane is probably of 15th-century date, with substantial alterations and additions made in the 16th, 17th, 18th centuries and in modern times. It is constructed as a timber-framed structure with brick, featuring a 3-bay timber-framed hall with an arched braced roof towards the east end, and a 2-bay storeyed end at the west. The house now stands two storeys high with an attic, with gable ends hung with shaped and plain tiles beneath an old tiled roof.

Historical Context

In the 13th and 14th centuries, the Vicar of Farnham received the substantial stipend of £11 a year specifically to provide entertainment for pilgrims. This building originally consisted of a hall with an open timber roof and a priest's chamber above the north porch, reached by ladder from the hall. The roof timbers, constructed with collar beam design and arched-bracing, remain visible on the first and attic floors and are in a remarkable state of preservation, with the oak retaining its yellowish-grey colour and all joints remaining tight. It is believed that the first floor was inserted in the 16th century along with at least one partition on this floor. A doorway in this partition survives with a moulded oak frame and 4-centred arched head with splayed and moulded spandrels. The attic floor dates to a later period, with partitions and windows added over successive centuries.

North Elevation

The north elevation faces the churchyard. The front of the building originally featured a central projecting gabled porch. At a later date, walls were built flush with the porch front, and the resulting ground-floor rooms were roofed by sweeping the main floor down at a slightly flatter pitch. In the current century, the same treatment was applied to the porch, creating a wide central gable with the original 14th or 15th-century bold carved and cusped bargeboard remaining in position. The entire gable is tile-hung. The ground floor is colour-washed brick. The first floor displays one 3-light leaded casement window at the centre of the gable and two small 2-light casement windows at lower level in the extended part of the gable, with one gabled 3-light dormer window to the left-hand side. A 2-light casement window with shutter appears to the right-hand on the ground floor, a 4-light casement window to the right of centre, and a 5-panelled door in an architrave frame to the left of centre beneath a 19th-century lattice porch.

West Elevation

The west elevation contains one 3-light leaded casement window in the attic, two 2-light similar windows on the first floor, and yard extensions on the ground floor.

South Elevation

The south elevation features two 2-light hipped dormer windows in the attic. On the first floor are two 4-light mullioned and transomed windows, two sash windows, one tall slightly projecting chimney stack, and one sash window to the right-hand side. The ground floor contains one 3-light casement window to the left-hand, one 18th-century half-glazed door with 2-paned side lights on either side, a chimney stack, and one similar half-glazed door and windows to the right-hand. The first floor is tile-hung to the right-hand side of the chimney stack.

Interior

The interiors contain remains of varying dates, including one 18th-century room on the ground floor with dado and two arched niches. Modern alterations have been carried out in keeping with the character of the house.

Setting

There is a walled kitchen garden to the west of the house with brick and ragstone walls. The garden to the south overlooks water meadows and the River Way. The listed buildings in Vicarage Lane, Churchyard, Church Passage, Upper Church Lane (north-west side), Middle Church Lane, and Lower Church Lane (west end) form a group.