Westacott Farmhouse

SS 60 NE 1/46 26.8.65

COLDRIDGE WESTACOTT LANE Westacott Farmhouse

II

Farmhouse. Probably late C15 with major C16 and C17 improvements, modernised in late C19, C20 extension. Plastered cob on rubble footings; stone rubble stacks topped with C19 and C20 brick; thatch roof including a small slated section. 3-room-and-through-passage plan house facing south with inner room at right (east) end. Service end room divided into 2 in C20. Projecting end stacks to service and inner rooms and projecting front lateral stack to hall with hall window in a projecting bay alongside. Projecting newel stair turret to rear of hall. C19 and C20 outshots to rear including a flat-roofed 2-storey extension to rear of service room. 2 storeys. Irregular 2:1:1 - window front comprising a variety of late C19 and C20 casements with glazing bars. Front doorway to passage left of centre contains late C19 panelled door with Gothic-style hinges with contemporary rubble porch with plain elliptical-headed outer arch and gabled and slate roof. Immediately to right of doorway is the large stack and hall bay with its own gabled roof. The roof close to the hall stack and bay is slated. Roof is gable-ended to right and hipped to left. Interior shows work of several periods. The oldest exposed structure is the 2-bay roof over the hall and passage between full height cob crosswalls. The truss here is a jointed cruck fixed by 2 face pegs and a slip tenon. It is probably late C15 and although the roofspace is inaccessible it is expected to be smoke-blackened. The hall fireplace was probably inserted to the late C16-early C17 but it appears to have been much rebuilt since and the fireplace has not been discovered. In the rear wall a late C16-early C17 oak doorframe to newel stair has chamfered surround with step stops. The hall was floored sometime in C17 with unstopped soffit- chamfered crossbeams. Inner room has late C16-early C17 soffit-chamfered and step stopped crossbeam and a rubble fireplace with roughly-finished oak lintel of probably late C17 or C18 date. In the passage the headbeam of an oak plank-and- muntin screen shows but its form if it survives is hidden. The service room appears to have been rebuilt in the late C17 or C18 with roughly-finished crossbeams and similar oak lintel to rubble fireplace. Apart from the hall and passage roof the rest is carried on A-frame trusses of C17 or C18 date. Only the feet of the trusses can be examined.

Listing NGR: SS6854907364