Quay Cottage

House. Built around the early to mid-18th century. The ground floor is constructed of painted slatestone rubble with wooden lintels and cob infill. The roof is of dry Delabole slate, originally thatched, with scantle slate over the rear outshut and a lean-to on the right (south) side. Brick chimneys stand over the gable ends. The north gable is a party wall shared with an early to mid-19th century house.

The house has two main rooms at the front, arranged around a central passage, with two narrow service rooms at the rear within an integral outshut. It is two storeys high. The west front is symmetrical, with three windows and a central doorway. The doorway has a 20th-century door. All front windows are original, with the exception of a 20th-century dormer added to the roof of the lean-to on the right. These are 2 or 3-light casements with 8 panes and original wide glazing bars, and mostly original crown glass. The window above the door is narrower, with two lights. A further original 12-pane 2-light window is present in the rear outshut. The mullions and glazing bars have internal ovolo mouldings. The first-floor windows lean outwards, resembling the stern cabin windows of 18th-century ships.

Attached to the projecting gable end of the house on the north side is a section built of small, yellowish bricks, likely imported, dating from the 16th or 17th century.

The interior is largely unaltered, with an original dog-leg staircase within the right-hand (southern) half of the outshut, numerous 2-panel doors with ovolo-moulded panels, original floors, and roof structure. Pine floor beams (originally plastered over) show carpenters’ marks from previous use. Hearths have been partly blocked. The pine roof structure features lapped and pegged collars and apices, and battens for thatch, with a later structure added to support the slate roof.

This is an early and largely original example of a small, symmetrical double-depth house, notable for the nautical influence on the first-floor windows. It overlooks an 18th-century quay and an unspoiled section of Pill Creek.