1 Holway Cottage

Cottage. A late 18th-century dwelling with an early 19th-century non-domestic addition, located in Thorncombe.

The building is constructed in cob to its southern two bays, with the northern bay built of random rubble. It is rectangular on plan, oriented north-west to south-east, with a half-hipped roof clad in corrugated sheeting, though this likely originally bore thatch. The roof has a brick ridge stack. Most windows are 20th-century replacements.

The original cottage comprised two bays of one and a half storeys, to which a single bay was added at the north end prior to 1840. A single-storey brick outbuilding was attached to the southern end after 1930 and is not of special interest.

The principal elevation faces south-west onto the garden. The northern addition, with its higher roofline, contains a slightly off-centre wide doorway with a 19th-century plank and batten door and a two-light casement beneath a timber lintel. The central and right-hand bays, representing the earliest part of the cottage, have a ground-floor entrance door with a 20th-century porch and a three-light window, with a single casement above. A rubble stone buttress has been added between these. The south-east and roadside elevations have 20th-century replacement windows. The rear (north-east) has been partly re-faced in brick and retains a two-light timber window with leaded panes, deeply recessed; the northern bay has an inserted late 20th-century window.

The interior of the earlier cottage contains a single ground-floor room with a large open fireplace fitted with a chamfered timber bressumer. This section retains 18th-century joinery including plank doors, a winder staircase, and elm floorboards to the upper floor. A single collared truss visible in the bedroom is consistent with a late 18th-century date. The northern bay, constructed in the early 19th century, has fewer historic features, consistent with its original non-domestic function, possibly as a stable.

The property is depicted on the Tithe map of 1839 and on an earlier map of 1811, alongside two neighbouring properties. The building exemplifies vernacular rural domestic accommodation of modest proportions and simple construction.