Numbers 1-4 Castle Cottages

Castle Cottages is a row of four cottages located in Branscombe, dating from the mid to late 19th century, although they have earlier origins. The cottages are primarily constructed from local stone rubble, with some Salcombe stone ashlar dressings at the southern end and cob at the rear. They feature stone rubble stacks topped with 19th and 20th-century brick and have thatched roofs.

The cottages are arranged in a row across a hillslope, facing east-south-east. They are numbered 1 to 4 from left to right (south to north). Cottages 1 and 2 are designed as one-room plan cottages, with No. 1 having a gable-end stack and No. 2 featuring an axial stack that backs onto No. 1. Cottages 3 and 4 are two-room plan cottages that share an axial stack in the party wall between them. The rear wall indicates that the cottages were not built on an open site but rather incorporated and enlarged an earlier building. The rear wall of Nos. 1 and 3 is made of cob, and a straight join in the rear wall suggests that the end room of No. 4 was an extension of the original one-room plan cottage. All four cottages are two storeys high.

The exterior showcases an irregular six-window front, featuring 19th and 20th-century replacement casements with glazing bars—one window each for Nos. 1 and 2, and two windows each for Nos. 3 and 4. The first-floor windows rise slightly into the eaves. Each cottage has a 20th-century part-glazed door with contemporary gabled hoods. The roof runs continuously over all four cottages, hipped to the right and gable-ended to the left, with shaped kneelers and coping. The interiors were not inspected, but it is noted that little carpentry detail is exposed.