Wigham Farmhouse Including Outbuilding Adjoining To North-West

Wigham Farmhouse is a mid-17th century farmhouse with an adjoining outbuilding, formerly a barn and shippon with a layloft above. A 20th-century extension was added later. The farmhouse is constructed of plastered cob on rubble footings; the outbuildings are of rubble. The farmhouse has thatched roofing, while the outbuildings have corrugated iron. The long range overlooks a valley to the south-west, comprising the farmhouse to the right and the former barn to the left. A shippon block projects at a right angle from the left (north-west) end. The farmhouse originally had a four-room plan, including a dairy at the left end, a service room to the centre left, a hall to the centre right, and an inner room at the right end, now with a single-story 20th-century extension. The service room has a large lateral stack projecting to the rear and a large axial stack to the hall, which backs onto the service room. There is an apparent original central door, creating a lobby entrance plan, and a newel turret projects to the rear of the hall. The farmhouse is two storeys high and has a seven-window front of late 19th and 20th century casements, mostly circa 1980 PVC casements, with glazing bars or applied lead. The five first-floor windows have thatched eyebrows; a 20th-century French window sits to the left of the farmhouse centre, and a late 19th century gabled dormer is above the former barn. Both doors have porches, with a gabled thatched roof on the main door porch and an open-sided porch to the dairy. The roof is gabled to the right, with a hipped roof to the 20th-century extension and a hipped roof to the former shippon. The stacks have original plastered rubble chimney shafts, now extended with brick. The rear of the inner room has an 18th-century two-light flat-faced mullion window with two vertical iron bars each, and small rectangular panes of leaded glass. The interior is notably well preserved. The dairy and inner room have plain carpentry detail. The service room features a chamfered and scroll-stopped cross beam, although the fireplace was rebuilt in the 20th century. The hall contains a massive stone fireplace with a chamfered and scroll-stopped lintel, an early brick bread oven with a stone doorway to the right, and an oak plank-and-muntin screen with chamfered and run-out-stopped posts to the inner room, along with a cream oven alcove in the front wall. Original features include an original stairhead lobby with a round-headed arch to the inner room chamber, oak doorframes with chamfered and scroll-stopped surrounds to the hall and service room chambers, and original roof trusses with unusually-shaped dovetail lap-jointed collars. The interior of the barn shows the blocking of large opposing doorways, and the shippon contains plain chamfered crossbeams and some reused 17th century roof members in the present late 19th – early 20th century roof. It is a well-preserved, single-phase farmhouse of considerable interest.