Barns Green Village Store

Barns Green Village Store

An early 19th-century range of cottages, altered in the later 19th century to include an integral village shop, and in the mid-20th century to form a single house with an extended shop.

The building is constructed of rendered walls and mixed stock brick, beneath a clay tile roof. The house has a principal west-facing elevation with a centralised 20th-century porch and entrance. The rooms are mainly situated on the western front, accessed by rear north-south passageways on the ground and first floors. To the south is an attached mid-20th-century single-storey rectangular shop extension.

The principal west elevation is two-storey and comprises eight bays, formed by the front face of the former cottages. From the north, all bays have flush-fitted 20th-century multi-paned timber casement windows, except the fifth bay, which has a 20th-century gabled porch and entrance door of vertical plank construction. The clay tiled roof has three internal chimney stacks rising through the ridgeline, with the central stack containing two chimneys. The ground floor of the two southernmost bays is enclosed by the mid-20th-century shop, which is not included in the listing.

The rear east elevation is predominantly of 20th-century date, characterised by a projecting single-storey extension of mixed stock brick in Sussex bond with attic dormers. Though not adding to the building's special interest, it is carefully detailed and integral to the current plan and form. All fenestration in the extension comprises 20th-century timber multi-paned casements. The clay-tiled roof follows the original pitch to form a catslide. There are eight bays in total: the central six form the extension, while at each end a single bay of the original two-storey rendered rear wall is visible. At the south end, the original bay has a horned four-pane sash window to the first floor and a 20th-century metal casement window below.

Internally, the central hall is double-height with a dog-leg 20th-century timber stair to the north, terminating at the rear onto a galleried landing with a timber-framed ceiling running the length of the rear. A further passageway provides ground-floor access to all rooms. The ground floor has two rooms either side of the hall. The northern room features an inglenook fireplace constructed of large mixed stock bricks in English bond, with a curved bressumer above and a brick bread oven to the side. This room also has an exposed timber ceiling frame formed of narrow axial floor joists. The southern room retains vestiges of an inglenook with curved bressumer but has a later brick fireplace surround, and a single central beam running north to south. The other ground-floor sitting rooms are plain, except the northernmost, which has a square brick 19th-century fireplace. The first-floor rooms are similarly plain, except the northernmost room, which has an early-20th-century small brick fireplace, and the central room, which has a beam running west to east. Several 19th-century plank doors are present throughout the house, possibly repositioned, and most window openings retain exposed timber lintels. In the southeast corner at ground floor, the original external walls have been opened up, and the opening for one of the original west-facing cottage entrance doors remains intact. Above this area, the timber-framed ceiling of the terrace is visible, including a large chamfered beam running east to west.