Shutes Farmhouse

Shutes Farmhouse is a farmhouse dating from the early to mid-17th century, substantially renovated around 1980 and with a later extension. The construction combines local stone rubble and flint rubble, with stone rubble stacks topped with 19th-century and 20th-century brickwork, and a slate roof, originally thatched. The original layout was an L-shaped plan, comprising a three-room main block, originally with a central service room. To the south-east is a former kitchen with a gable-end stack, and alongside it, a winder stair which was converted from a former curing chamber; the partition between the kitchen and service room has been removed. A former parlour is located at the left end, also with a gable-end stack. A secondary, single-room block projects at right angles in front of the parlour, converted from agricultural to domestic use around 1980, and a 20th-century extension exists at the left end. The main block is two storeys high. The front of the main block has an irregular two-window façade with 20th-century elm-framed casement windows featuring 17th-century style ovolo-moulded mullions. A 20th-century plank door is set within the front doorway. The roofs are gable-ended. The rear of the main block retains three original 17th-century oak-framed windows, two with ovolo-moulded mullions and one with chamfered mullions. A small Beerstone light with a round head is visible in the gable-end of the main block, above the stair/former curing chamber. The interior was thoroughly but carefully renovated around 1980, featuring replacement elm carpentry mostly from that period. The parlour retains original carpentry, including a roughly-finished crossbeam and a stone rubble fireplace with a chamfered oak lintel. The service room and kitchen have 1980s ceiling carpentry, but retain the original Beerstone ashlar kitchen fireplace with a chamfered oak lintel, featuring a side oven and a blocked opening to the stairwell, demonstrating its former use as a curing chamber. The roof of the main block contains two original side-pegged jointed cruck trusses. The carpentry detail of the attached block is from around 1980.