Venn Ottery Barton Including Outbuildings Adjoining To West

Venn Ottery Barton is a guest house and former farmhouse of 16th-century origins, substantially refurbished in the late 17th and early 18th centuries and thoroughly modernised around 1810. A further extension was added around 1810 and another circa 1970. The building comprises mostly plastered cob on stone rubble footings, with later extensions in plastered brick, stone and concrete blocks. The chimneys are stone rubble stacks topped with 19th and 20th-century brick. The roofs are slate, though the pre-19th-century parts were formerly thatched.

The main block, facing north, retains the original three-room-and-through-passage plan with the inner room at the left (eastern) end. The inner room has a projecting end stack and the hall has a projecting front lateral stack. The wall to the right of the hall stack has been brought forward flush with the front of the stack. Evidence of a chimney shaft indicates the service end room once had a front lateral stack, though only a disused kitchen-size end fireplace shows inside, suggesting the front stack may have served only a first-floor fireplace. A 20th-century corridor now blocks the rear of the original passage. Around 1810 the main house was rearranged with a cross passage inserted in the inner room leading to a new parallel block built behind it, which includes a contemporary staircase with a right (western) end stack. Farmbuildings were added to the right end of the main block at this time, incorporating some replaced 17th-century features. Around 1970 a single-room extension was added to the left end of the circa 1810 rear extension on the same axis, and the farmbuildings closest to the house were converted to guest rooms. The building is two storeys throughout.

The main house presents an irregular five-window front with 19th-century oak-framed three-light casements with glazing bars. The main doorway, now left of centre, is an early 19th-century six-panel door (now part-glazed) with reeded panel frames. A contemporary flat-roofed open porch features clustered piers with square-cornered shafts and a moulded entablature. The original front passage doorway, right of centre, contains a late 17th-century studded plank door with moulded coverstrips and strap hinges with fleur-de-lys finials, with a narrow overlight above. An early 19th-century timber eaves cornice is moulded with a modillion cornice. The roof is gable-ended. The rear has some 19th-century but mostly 20th-century casements, except for the hall which retains a late 17th or early 18th-century three-light oak casement with flat-faced mullions and shallow internal mouldings. The 19th and 20th-century extensions are gable-ended.

On the right end of the main block, set back slightly and under a lower roof, are 19th-century outbuildings. Adjacent to the house and now converted to domestic use is a block of uncertain original function, possibly a cider-house given fenestration suggesting part-flooring. A plain upright window at the left end suggests that end was originally open. None of the windows are glazed (they have 20th-century glass behind). The ground-floor window has a moulded oak 17th-century frame but the mullions and iron bars are 19th-century. Directly above is a smaller oak three-light window retaining ovolo-moulded mullions. Another plain 19th-century window sits to the right of this. The doorway at the left end has an ovolo-moulded and scroll-stopped lintel, a solid oak frame with chamfered surround, and contains an old plank door with strap hinges. The first floor is weatherboarded. The 17th-century features here are of high quality and clearly derive from domestic rooms, apparently reused when replaced in the main house in the early 19th century. At the right end is a four-and-a-half-bay linhay projecting forwards at right angles (Alcock's type T1 linhay).

The interior contains work from all main building periods, with the finest features being the earliest. The large hall fireplace is mid-16th-century, built of Beerstone ashlar though the surround is somewhat mutilated, with a massive stone lintel. The ceiling dates from the same period or slightly later and was probably inserted into a previously open hall. It is a four-bay intersecting beam ceiling with richly-moulded main beams, while the half beams have only deep chamfers. In the inner room, no ceiling beam is visible, but the late 16th-century fireplace is well-preserved, with Beerstone ashlar sides, a timber lintel believed to be chestnut, a chamfered surround and worn stops. The service end room appears to have been rebuilt as a kitchen, probably in the late 17th or early 18th century. Its massive fireplace is blocked and the crossbeam is of large scantling but square-cornered. A late 17th or early 18th-century back doorway contains a two-panel door hung on H-L hinges. On the first floor is another similar door with fielded panels to the inner room chamber, which also includes two cupboards with contemporary panelled doors on H-hinges. The early plaster is backed on water reed rather than wooden lathes. The roof was apparently rebuilt at this time, with two A-frame trusses with pegged lap-jointed collars remaining; the rest was replaced in the 19th century. The interior of the adjoining farmbuilding was rebuilt circa 1970 and the roofspace there is inaccessible.

This is an attractive farmhouse with interesting development. Other 16th and 17th-century features may be uncovered during renovation work, particularly in the crosswalls either side of the original passage and at the upper end of the hall. The building is picturesquely sited and groups with the late 17th or early 18th-century forecourt wall and contemporary pavilion in a manner very similar to nearby Elliots Farm.