Underdown Farmhouse

Underdown Farmhouse is a house dating from the 16th and 17th centuries, significantly refurbished and enlarged in the mid to late 19th century. It is constructed of local stone and flint rubble, with some cob, and has stone rubble stacks topped with 19th and 20th-century brick, all under a thatched roof.

The farmhouse is built across a hillslope, facing west-northwest. The original plan was of a four-room-and-through-passage house. A detached, unheated dairy, with a natural spring running beneath its floor, is located at the south end. The hall, with a large axial stack backing onto the passage, is positioned next to the passage. Further along are the inner room (now the kitchen) and a parlour on the right end, sharing a back-to-back fireplace with an axial stack between them. Originally, the house may have been a two or three-room-and-through-passage plan, and the parlour on the right end was added in the mid to late 19th century. The structure of the roof has been largely replaced, obscuring earlier development, but it is likely the house began as an open hall house. The hall stack probably dates from the mid to late 16th century and was likely floored over in the early or mid 17th century. A solid crosswall separates the hall from the inner room, suggesting the inner room may have been an addition, built or rebuilt in the mid to late 17th century when the hall was converted into a kitchen. The 19th-century parlour has a former cheese loft above.

The exterior presents a regular, though not symmetrical, five-window front, largely featuring 19th-century casement windows with glazing bars. A few older casement windows with leaded glass panes are present on the left and rear. A first-floor window on the right end is designed as a loading hatch for the cheese loft. A 19th-century part-glazed plank door, protected by a 20th-century gabled porch, is at the passage front. A secondary lobby entrance with a late 19th-century one-panel door behind a 20th-century porch is situated towards the right end. Near the left end, an opening provides access to a spring. The roof is half-hipped at each end.

Inside, the passage floor is paved with 19th-century bricks. The hall contains a fireplace with Beerstone ashlar jambs and a chamfered oak lintel; the crossbeam is hollow-chamfered without stops. In the kitchen (formerly the parlour), the fireplace is blocked, and the axial beam is chamfered with exaggerated scroll stops. The roof is largely composed of A-frame trusses, although one boxed-in truss may be a jointed cruck. The farmhouse is a multi-phase building of considerable interest and appeal.