Sellake Farmhouse

Sellake Farmhouse is a farmhouse dating from around 1600. It is constructed of cob with a stone plinth and has a plastered finish under a thatched roof with gabled ends. The layout consists of a three-room, through-passage plan with a rear outshut that has a slated catslide roof. The higher end of the house is to the left of the passage. There are several stacks: an external left-hand end stack heats the inner room, a rear lateral stack (formerly external) heats the hall, and an internal right-hand end stack with a bake-oven bulge heats the service end. All stacks feature brick shafts, with the lateral stack primarily made of stone.

The farmhouse is two-storeys high and has a front elevation with a five-window range, all of which are casement windows. The first-floor windows, except for the one at the lower end, are barred and date from the 19th century, set under very shallow eyebrow eaves, with eight panes per light. The inner room has a chamber with five lights, while the others have three lights. On the ground floor, there are three four-light barred casement windows, French windows leading to the inner room, a 19th-century panelled door to the passage, and another door leading to the lower end, which is the kitchen. The right-hand end elevation has two two-light windows, and there is one 20th-century metal-framed window on the left; the rear features two and five-light windows.

Inside, the lower end room has a deeply chamfered cross beam, and the fireplace lintel, which has been partially removed due to fire damage in February 1985, is exceptionally large. There is a stud and panel screen with chamfered edges and carpenter's mitres at the lower end of the passage. The hall features composite double ovolo and double cavetto intersecting beams that create a grid of four ceiling squares. The inner room has intersecting beams that support an unusual moulding of two rolls flanking a run of raised saltires or dogtooth ornaments, also forming a grid of four ceiling squares. The roof consists of four jointed crucks with an apex that is morticed and pegged, a diagonal ridge-piece, and straight collars that are pegged and morticed, along with two pairs of trenched purlins. The roof structure is generally clean, although the left-hand end truss has been charred by fire.