21 And 21A, The Close

This is an early canonical house, originally dating to the 13th century and altered in the 14th and 15th centuries. An early 19th-century refurbishment significantly changed the appearance of the building. It is two storeys high and constructed of rubble stone, flint, and tile, with an old tile roof. The front is double-gabled, featuring pierced stone balustrading between the gables and at the outer corners, topped with finials. Each gable has stone copings and a carved finial. The front elevation has large, moulded stone mullioned windows. The ground floor features a central door with a two-light casement above, set within a slightly projecting early 19th-century porch with a four-centred arch and pierced balustrade. The windows are drip-moulded.

The west front has two storeys with four windows on the first floor and three on the ground floor, incorporating mostly renewed stone mullioned casements. A three-storey section extends to the rear, with a hipped old tile roof and an external stepped chimney. The east front includes a rendered, projecting gabled bay and a flint and stone rubble gabled section. A pointed arch provides access to the side. The earliest part of the building is at the rear. A chapel with blocked lancets, opening to the east, is located in the east corner, while the west corner showcases a three-storey block—the tile-hung second floor sits upon a moulded base, representing the 15th-century addition; flint rubble forms the lower section. It features two stone mullioned windows and a blocked cusped window, alongside a corbelled chimney with a brick upper portion.

The entrance hall retains remnants of a 15th-century frieze depicting a boar, a lamb, and a flag. A presumed chapel from the 13th century exhibits lancet windows. The base of the northwest block’s three-storey section features tunnel vaulting. A first-floor room is characterized by a waggon roof, plastered with thin ribs in an octagonal pattern, likely dating to the early 19th century. Additionally, there is some 17th-century panelling. A similar ceiling is found in a room within No. 21A. This section of the house incorporates an 18th-century staircase with a closed string and turned balusters. First-floor features include remains of a cambered collar and windbrace, alongside a blocked 14th-century archway close to floor level. A reset 16th-century frieze, incorporating the arms of Catherine of Aragon, is situated in a rear ground-floor room. The 15th-century addition to the northwest corner’s second floor exhibits the bases of trusses (three bays) and portions of brackets, suggesting a gable-end roof existed prior to the current hipped roof. In the mid-19th century, the house served as the residence of Canon W Lyle Bowles, who added the front porch. The listed buildings within The Close represent an outstanding group.