Higher Dunsaller

Higher Dunsaller is a house dating from the 17th century, with alterations and renovations in the 20th century. The walls are whitewashed plastered cob, and the roof is thatched with a plain ridge, hipped at the left end, and gabled at the right. Brick chimney shafts are located at the ends of the main range and project laterally from the wing. The layout is complex due to 20th-century alterations, appearing as an "L" shape with the main range running north-south and a parallel east-west wing at the north end. It is possible the house has been reoriented and that the wing was originally the 17th-century main range, as carpentry details from that period are present in both sections. The current main range is a single-depth, two-room plan with an entrance into the left-hand room and a 20th-century staircase in the centre. The east wing contains one heated room and a narrow room, possibly a former passage, adjacent to the main range. Former farm buildings attached to the end of the wing have been converted into living space, and a 20th-century porch has been added to the angle between the two blocks. The west front has two storeys and an attic and is asymmetrical with three windows. There is a thatched porch and a 20th-century front door to the left of centre, with 19th or 20th-century timber casement windows with glazing bars, including two separately-roofed attic dormers. The interior has been largely modernized; however, some 17th-century features remain. A partly-blocked 17th-century fireplace with chamfered volcanic stone jambs and a scroll-stopped lintel is located in the ground floor room to the right. The wing features an axial beam that runs through both the heated and narrow rooms; it is chamfered but scroll-stopped only in the narrow, unheated room. The roof is an apex-pegged collar rafter structure. The roofspace above the main range contains a plastered partition with cob infill projecting above the stairs. The roofspace above the wing has a complete plastered partition and a chamfered stopped 17th-century doorframe.