Greenways Farmhouse

Greenways Farmhouse

A farmhouse of early 16th-century origins with later 16th and 17th-century improvements, substantially altered by major 19th and 20th-century refurbishment and modernisation. The building is constructed of local stone and flint rubble with stone rubble chimney stacks, one retaining its original stone rubble chimneyshaft whilst others are topped with 19th and 20th-century brick. The roof is thatched, though sections to the rear have been replaced with slate.

The house sits on essentially level ground with an irregular plan. The main block faces south-west and comprises three rooms. At the north-west end is a study-office with a projecting front lateral stack. A large central room contains an axial stack, adjoining a narrower right-end room used as kitchen-dining room. Two-storey outshots extend to the rear of the central and left rooms, incorporating the main stair behind the study-office. The principal entrance is now located at the left end into the stair hall, with a secondary entrance into the centre of the main room, sheltered by a porch. A single-room-plan block projects at right angles in front of the right room. This layout largely results from 19th and 20th-century refurbishment.

The historic core comprises the left and centre rooms of the main block, originally laid out as a three-room-and-through-passage plan. The left room served as the inner room, whilst the large central room was created by removing both passage partitions to unite the hall, passage and service-end kitchen. Much early carpentry detail has been lost, but one surviving early 16th-century roof truss demonstrates that much, if not all, of the original house was open to the roof and heated by open hearth fire. The timing of chimney stack and floor insertion is unclear due to extensive later rebuilding, though the service end appears to have been rebuilt as a kitchen in the early to mid-17th century. The front wing and right-end room were constructed in the 19th century as service and agricultural outbuildings, substantially rebuilt when converted to domestic use in the 20th century. The rear outshots are likewise probably 19th-century, much rebuilt in the 20th century. The house is two storeys throughout.

The exterior features an irregular fenestration pattern of 3:1:1 with 20th-century casement windows with glazing bars, matching those around other sides. The former passage-front doorway lies left of centre behind a 20th-century gabled porch containing a contemporary glazed door. The left-end doorway contains a 20th-century door sheltered by a thatch-roofed porch on plain posts. The roofs display half-hipped ends.

The interior is largely the product of 19th and 20th-century modernisation, with most exposed carpentry dating from these phases. Despite this, the original layout remains appreciable and some older carpentry may remain concealed. The hall fireplace is blocked, and the former inner room fireplace appears to be a 19th-century rebuild. The 17th-century kitchen fireplace survives, constructed of stone rubble with an oak-framed front and incorporating a large oven. Across the chimneybreast runs a contemporary chamfered and step-stopped half beam. Above the kitchen, the remains of an early 16th-century side-pegged jointed cruck truss survive, along with purlins, common rafters and the underside of original thatch in the adjacent bays—all smoke-blackened from the original hearth fire. A reused early 17th-century moulded beam is incorporated in the front wing.