The Ancient Priors (Minters Restaurant A Louis Coiffeur)

HIGH STREET 1. 5403 (east side) No 49 and No 51 The Ancient Priors (Minters Restaurant A Louis Coiffeur) (formerly listed as No 47, The Square) TQ 2636 NE 5/24 21.6.48 II* GV 2. Timber-framed hall-house of circa 1450 with L-wing added circa 1530 and modern brick wing later. Restored in 1927. Two storeys timber-framed with Horsham slab roof. Four bays. Front elevation has projecting first floors on brackets with gables above with decorative curved braces. Front elevation mainly close-studded. Side elevation square framing. Modern casement windows but blocked original window openings remain. Later shopfronts. Doorcase has a flat arch with shield in spandrels. On one of these is a crown of antique shape, 2 fleur de lys seen sideways, a third in the middle and a leaf between. The hall runs north to south with a solar and chamber beneath it either end. The hall is 23ft long of 2 bays, each about 10ft long. Open timber roof with cambered tie beam, arch-braced collar beam, moulded wall plates and curved mid-braces. A chimney and floor were inserted in the C16. Two C16 stone fireplaces in the ground and first floor rooms at the north end. A 2-storey wing, probably a kitchen wing of about 1530 projects eastward from the south end. Two staircases, are hung a heavy Jacobean rail with turned balusters. A complete and well-preserved example of a C15 hall-house. This may have been the Pre-Reformation Priest's house. Reputed connexions with smuggling. (See V C H Sussex vii 144. Sussex Archaeological Collections Vol LV (1912) pp 12-16).

Listing NGR: TQ2678836580