The Thatch

The Thatch is a house, originally a farmhouse, dating to the mid-to-late 16th century. It has undergone alterations and extensions in the late 17th century, the 19th century, and around 1980. The original core is built of plastered cob on stone rubble footings, with some later 17th-century brickwork; stacks are of stone rubble or brick, topped with 19th and 20th-century brick. The roof is thatched.

The main block, originally a three-room plan house with a through-passage, now comprises two rooms facing west: the hall on the north end and an inner room to the south. Both rooms have rear lateral stacks. In the late 17th century, the southern end wall was rebuilt in brick, and two further rooms were added to the rear under parallel roofs set at right angles to the main roof. These rear extensions were rearranged around 1980 and now house the main staircase, also dating from this period. The original passage and service room of the main block’s west end may have been demolished in the late 17th or 19th century. C19 brickwork is visible on the left (northern) end wall of the main block.

The front of the main block has a regular two-window arrangement of casement windows dating from around 1980, with glazing bars. These windows are flanked by sloping buttresses, and those on the first floor have thatched eyebrows above them. A circa 1980 porch shelters the front door, located at the left end of the wall. The roof is gable-ended. The right (southern) end wall and the later 17th-century rear extensions are whitewashed English bond brick, featuring a plat band at first-floor level and segmental arches over the windows. The south side has a two-window front with casement windows similar to those on the front. The rear roofs are lower than the main house, creating a double-gabled rear elevation in the same style.

Inside the main block, the full-height crosswall is original and features a closed, side-pegged jointed cruck truss with an oak plank-and-muntin screen. This screen has chamfered muntins with stop-chamfered stops and includes a segmental-headed doorway. The screen retains extensive remains of late 16th-century painted decoration, including short Biblical quotations within crude strapwork cartouches of ancient colour. The hall contains an original rubble fireplace with a soffit-chamfered oak lintel and a two-bay roof with an open side-pegged jointed cruck truss. The hall floor is likely from the early 17th century and is supported by a soffit-chamfered cross beam. In the inner room, the fireplace is blocked, and no crossbeam is visible. The roof here uses a late 17th-century A-frame truss with pegged lap-jointed collars. The front block roof is unusually tall. The rear extension has been significantly modernised, but the basic late 17th-century structure appears largely intact, with a roughly-finished axial beam and roofs featuring A-frame trusses with pegged lap-jointed collars, and an oak post supporting the inner principal rafters in the valley between the trusses.