Downrew Cottages

A farmhouse, now divided into two private residences, dating from the late 15th or early 16th century with alterations in the 17th century. The building is constructed of rendered stone and cob, with an asbestos slate roof featuring gable ends to the front range and a hipped roof to a rear extension. Originally a three-cell through-passage plan, it was formerly an open hall house. A right-angled rear extension, originally an outbuilding, was incorporated into the left-hand cottage, with the division of the house preserving the original plan, although the through-passage has become a sealed passage with the internal doorways removed. The lower end of the house may have once housed animals. An axial hall stack backs onto the through-passage, with a bread oven projecting into the passage. Additional stacks have been inserted at the corners of the front range. The building is two storeys high with a three-window front, one window on the right side being beneath a gabled half dormer. A plank door leads to the through-passage. A 16th-century rear passage doorway exists, featuring shouldered jambs and a gentle ogee head.

Inside, a two-panelled door leads to a staircase in the lower end; the ceiling beams are roughly chamfered, while the hall beams run along rather than across the hall. One hall beam, close to the front wall, has an elaborately stopped ovolo moulding to its inner edge. A 19th-century chimney piece stands within what was originally a wider hearth, with a doorway providing access to the flue. A two-panelled door leads to a former stair turret behind the hall. Keel stops are visible on a chamfered inner room beam. The medieval roof structure is largely intact, featuring four raised cruck trusses with cranked collars, all jointed except for the truss nearest the axial stack on the lower side, which features uninterrupted blades reducing in section above and below the collar. Trenched purlins and a diagonally set ridge purlin survive, along with most of the rafters. The truss directly over the upper end of the hall is closed with a cob and lath and plaster partition, smoke-blackened only on its inner surface. The truss and rafters over the inner room have been replaced. The thickness of the wall dividing the hall and inner room suggests the latter may have always been floored over. Matching levels of smoke-blackening on the hall and lower end roof structures indicate that these areas were floored over concurrently.