Luton Barton House

Luton Barton House is a house with late medieval origins, significantly remodelled in the early 17th century and altered in the 18th or 19th century. It is built of whitewashed rendered cob and stone rubble, with a thatched roof; the left end is half-hipped and the right end gabled, with a plain ridge. A stack is located on the right end, and back-to-back fireplaces are within an axial stack to the left of centre. The house follows a T-shaped plan.

The west-facing main range is three rooms wide, containing remnants of a through passage to the right of centre. The room on the right is heated by an end stack, while the two rooms to the left are heated by the axial stack. An unheated rear wing is set at right angles to the main range. The original house was an open hall, of which two blackened trusses remain. The wing appears to be of cruck construction and may itself be of medieval origin. The house was likely floored in the late 16th or early 17th century when the right-end stack was added; the axial stack appears to be part of a post-17th century rebuilding or alteration.

The exterior has an asymmetrical four-window front, with a probably 19th-century panelled front door set within a hipped porch canopy to the right of centre. There are 3 and 4-light timber casement windows, likely dating to the late 19th or 20th century.

Inside, plank and muntin screens remain in the passage; the right-hand screen is incomplete, and the left-hand screen has the remains of a blocked doorframe. The right-hand room is a lower-end parlour with a chamfered crossbeam and a high-quality fireplace featuring moulded Beerstone jambs and a massive stone lintel. The room above the passage has a ceiling of intersecting moulded beams, with approximately a metre of one beam being part of a plank and muntin screen, suggesting either an enlargement of the room with a replacement stack, or a reuse of the moulded beams. The fireplace contains a late 19th-century grate. Surviving roof structures include two sooted trusses, presumed to be crucks, over the right and centre of the main range, where the rafters have been replaced. The rear wing possesses a side-pegged, jointed cruck roof structure with mortised collars and may be early 16th century. The building is a handsome traditional house of medieval origins and has group value with Salters Farmhouse opposite.