Southwoods Farmhouse

Southwoods Farmhouse is a 4-room-and-through-passage plan farmhouse, dating to the early or mid 16th century, with later 16th and 17th century alterations. It is constructed of plastered stone rubble, with some cob, and has stone rubble stacks topped with 20th-century brick, and a thatched roof. The house is situated on a gentle hillslope and faces northwest.

Originally, the house likely comprised a single open space, heated by an open hearth fire. Around the mid 16th century, an inner room was built, projecting into the hall. The hall fireplace was likely inserted in the mid or late 16th century. The service end may have been floored around the same time, but was thoroughly refurbished in the early or mid 17th century. The hall was later floored over. The farmhouse is now two storeys throughout.

The service end of the building is largely concealed by a 20th-century weatherboarded lean-to shed. The remainder of the building has an irregular two-window front with small, late 19th and 20th-century casement windows, the most recent without glazing bars. A roughly central doorway in the passage front, to the right of the hall stack, has a solid oak doorframe with a 19th-century architrave and a 19th-century plank door. The roof is gable-ended, with a ridge and eaves line that drops in height from the hall to the inner room.

The interior has largely been modernized in the 19th and 20th centuries, concealing much of the original 16th and 17th-century fabric. However, the early layout remains well-preserved, and evidence suggests that early carpentry and other details are hidden. A jetty is visible in the hall, and a doorway between the hall and the inner room reveals a headbeam of an oak plank-and-muntin screen. Oak screens are reported to line the passage. The hall fireplace is blocked by a 20th-century grate, and the hall crossbeam has broad soffit-chamfered stop-chamfered spine beams with run-out stops. The service end kitchen retains two axial beams with soffit-chamfers and shaped step stops, and its fireplace is blocked. An inaccessible roofspace reveals a side-pegged jointed cruck truss over the hall and another over the kitchen; others are likely incorporated into the first-floor partition.