The Folly

The Folly is a house dated 1693, with alterations from the 18th and early 19th centuries. It has a painted rendered exterior over limestone rubble, with freestone dressings and quoins, and a hipped stone slate roof with two small hipped dormers. Brick stacks are located on the rear wall and gable ends of the rear wings.

The house is symmetrically arranged with a three-window front, two storeys and an attic; it also has a cellar. Stone-mullioned windows have 20th-century casements; the window above the front door is two-light, the others are three-light, with cyma-moulded architraves and ovolo mouldings respectively. Returns have similar windows, some blocked with red brick. The front door has a 17th-century moulded architrave with worn stops and the inscription "A R A 1693" above it, a 18th-century six-panel door with glazing at the top, and a 20th-century gabled porch. The rear wings, one of which is numbered 33, are from the 18th century with early 19th century extensions.

The interior features a stone-flagged hall with 20th-century stairs and a room to the left which contains a chamfered cross-beam and a six-panel door. A room to the right has a planked door with wrought-iron strap hinges, a stone-flagged floor, an open fire with a timber lintel and a cavity on the left - likely a former smoking chamber extending to the floor above and the cellar below - a chamfered cross-beam, and an 18th-century architrave to a door leading to the rear service wing. This wing has a slate floor and a brick surround to an open fire. A planked door and stone steps lead down to the cellar from the left side of the stairs. The cellar has a Tudor-arched, barrel-vaulted ceiling, a stone floor and a working well with a lead overflow pipe. The roof has tenoned purlins. The rear left wing (No.33) has a small door to the cellar, one chamfered beam and a 19th-century brick open fire with a metal support to the segmental arch. It has a three-bay roof with morticed purlins.

The house, named The Folly, was mentioned in a will of AR Aland in 1791. The Alands were wealthy clothiers in the 17th and 18th centuries. The Reverend Francis Kilvert, known for his diary, lived here; his father was Rector of Hardenhuish from 1838 to 1847.