Wade Mill House

Wade Mill House, Molland

A farmhouse, now a private residence, dating from around 1500 and substantially remodelled in the early 17th century, with further alterations made in the 18th and late 19th centuries, and late 20th-century changes.

The building is constructed of coursed stone rubble, mostly rendered, with 19th-century brick dressings to openings and quoins at the right-hand end of the front elevation. The roof is a hipped thatch (late 20th-century replacement), with a scantle-slate lean-to roof at the rear. Stone square stacks with weatherings are positioned front and rear, the front stack having a brick top stage.

The house follows a 3-room and cross passage plan, facing south-east. It originated as a late Medieval open hall house comprising a central hall with a former cross passage and service room to the left and an inner room to the right, originally open to the roof throughout with low partitions. In the 17th century it was remodelled with the insertion of a first floor, a probable rebuilding of the cob wall between hall and inner room, the addition of external lateral stacks to the front of the hall and to the rear of the service and inner rooms, and a lean-to at the rear. The ceiling over the upper room dates no earlier than the 18th century. The hall ceiling is no earlier than the 17th century, and the hall may have remained open to the roof for some time after flooring the end rooms. The inner room was enlarged probably in the 18th century and further altered in the mid-to-late 19th century when a wing at right angles to the front was added (since demolished), marked by a set-back and brick dressings in the front wall. A staircase was inserted in the right-hand rear corner of the inner room in the 18th century. Late 20th-century works included probable removal of walls to the cross passage, alterations to the ceiling frame at the service end, insertion of a 20th-century staircase in the rear lean-to outshut, and insertion of all first-floor partitions. The service end was reduced in length in the late 20th century.

The front elevation displays asymmetrical fenestration: three first-floor late 20th-century 2-light wooden casements and a first-floor 2-light wooden casement to the right with wooden lintel and 20th-century concrete cill. Ground floor features a central 19th-century 3-light wooden casement to the hall, a 20th-century 2-light wooden casement to the service end at left, and a 20th-century 3-light wooden casement to the right, all with wooden lintels. A late 20th-century panelled oak door between the first and second windows from the left has a wooden lintel and is sheltered by a 20th-century gabled lattice wooden porch. A blocked doorway to the right-hand room has a segmental brick head and brick reveals. The front stack displays chamfered offsets and a small ground-floor window in its right-hand return; the stack base was widened at some point, evident from straight joints in line with the offsets. The end walls have 20th-century 3-light wooden casements to each floor and a 20th-century door to the right-hand end. The rear stack of the service room has a slightly curved bread oven projection to the left with a slate roof and a rendered square bread oven projection to the right with a monolithic slate roof.

Interior features have been substantially altered in the late 20th century. The ceiling frame over the left-hand room has a hollow-chamfered cross beam with run-out stops and wide joists, though said to have been altered in the late 20th century. An open stone fireplace to the rear of the former left-hand room has a wooden lintel and bread oven. The former hall at the centre has a probably late 17th or 18th-century ceiling comprising transverse joists. An open fireplace in the front wall has chamfered stone jambs and a wooden lintel. A window seat is fitted to the hall window to the left. A small 17th-century cupboard in the wall to the right has a one-panelled door with H-hinges of shaped ends. The wall plate along part of the front wall is reused timber with regularly-spaced pegged mortices, possibly a reused head beam from a former screen. An 18th-century open fireplace to the rear has a wooden lintel. An 18th-century door with six raised and fielded panels is situated in the corner to the right of the fireplace, formerly leading to the staircase. A mid-18th-century wall cupboard in the left-hand wall consists of two doors with two raised and fielded panels each, a false drawer below, and pigeon holes inside.

Remains of the late Medieval roof survive, including a smoke-blackened side-pegged jointed cruck truss at the left-hand (lower) end of the hall with trenches for former purlins, a cambered collar, and a mortice-and-tenoned apex with a notch for a former diagonally-set ridge-piece. The rear blade of the truss extends almost to ground-floor level with a hole at its foot, possibly used in the erection of the truss. A mortice in the rear blade at head height possibly formerly accommodated a head beam of a wooden screen.