Fancy Farmhouse

DUNKESWELL ST 10 NW 5/15 Fancy Farmhouse - - II Farmhouse. Early - mid C17, enlarged and partly rearranged in the late C19, modernised circa 1970. Local stone rubble with some late C19 brick dressings; stone rubble stacks topped with C20 brick; slate roof, originally thatch. Plan and development: 4-room-and-through-passage plan house facing south-south- west, say south. The main rooms are those 2 at the left (west) end with the passage between them. The end room is the principal parlour and it has a gable-end stack. The room the other side of the passage has an axial stack backing onto a small unheated room and, at the right (east) end is a stable (now a workshop). There are 2-storey service outshots across the rear and these include a kitchen with an axial stack. The original part of the house is the 2-room-and-through-passage section at the left (west) end. A straignt join in the front wall between this section and the rest proves that the unheated room and stable were added in the C19. The unheated room was built as a cellar/buttery but has now been converted to domestic use. However the original house must have been larger since the 2 rooms are well-appointed and there are no kitchen or service rooms. Presumably they were in some rear block which has been replaced by the rear outshots. House is 2 storeys throughout. Exterior: irregular 6-window front. The 3-window section to left (the original house) has early-mid C17 Beerstone windows with ovolo-moulded mullions and hoodmoulds to the ground floor windows. The passage front doorway contains a late C19 part-glazed 4-panel door. The right-hand 3-window section contains C20 casements most with glazing bars. The one over the stable doorway occupies the former hayloft loading hatch. The stable doorway and another into tne former cellar/buttery are C20. The roof is gable-ended. Interior: the 2-rooms of early-mid C17 house have good quality original features. Both rooms have Beerstone ashlar fireplaces with oak lintels, their soffits shaped as low Tudor arches. The left room fireplace has a chamfered surround and the one in the room right of the passage has a moulded surround. Both rooms have chamfered crossbeams but only those in the left room have scroll stops. There is a small original fireplace in the chamber over the left room. The rear wall of the original house contains an original 2-light Beerstone window containing rectangular panes of ancient leaded glass. (It is now internal). The roof structure over the original section still contains tne original A-frame trusses with pegged dovetail-shaped lap- jointed collars. The apexes have been cut off. The rest of the douse has C19 joinery and other detail and the hayloft floor was rebuilt circa 1970.

Listing NGR: ST1442007701