Higher Twitchen, Including Lofted Shippon Attached At East End

Former farmhouse, now used for holiday accommodation, located at Higher Twitchen in Burrington on Twitchen Lane. The building dates to the 16th century and was remodelled probably in the 17th century, with 20th-century alterations. It is constructed of painted rendered stone rubble and cob with an asbestos slate roof with gable ends.

The main house features a tall rendered front lateral hall stack, largely rebuilt in the 20th century. A rendered stack runs across the rear right-hand corner of the lower end, and an axial brick stack is positioned towards the left end, heating an inner room. The building follows a basically three-room and cross-passage plan. An outbuilding at the left (upper) end has been converted to a garage, and a lofted shippon is attached at the right end.

The original plan of the farmhouse has been obscured by later developments, but it certainly consisted of a former open hall, with the surviving original roof structure confined to the lower end below the present hall and passage partition. Probably in the 17th century, the hall was floored and the front lateral hall stack was inserted. A stair turret appears to have been added to the rear of the passage, but in the 19th century it was removed and remodelled as a two-storey service outshut. A straight run staircase was then inserted by taking the lower end of the hall into the passage.

A solid wall partition rises to first floor only between the hall and inner room. A pronounced straight joint and a break in roof levels over the centre of the inner room suggest extensive rebuilding at this end in the late 17th century to judge by the roof structure and inner room fireplace. The converted outbuilding and the part of the inner room to the left of the straight joint appear to be of integral build. The shippon attached at the lower right end appears also to have some late 17th or early 18th-century fabric.

The building is two storeys with a three-window range. All fenestration is 20th-century: two-light casements with two panes per light to the upper storey and ground floor right end, a hall window of three lights with three panes per light, an inner room window of two lights with three panes per light apparently inserted in a blocked doorway, and a further doorway giving direct entry into the inner room to the right. A 20th-century door serves the cross-passage doorway.

Interior features include extensive 20th-century alterations to the lower end, including blocking up of a fireplace across the rear angle. The rear cross-passage doorway formerly served the stair turret and has a chamfered lintel. A 19th-century four-panelled door opens into the hall. The hall has an unchamfered cross ceiling beam and a 19th-century chimneypiece with a small four-panelled cupboard door to the right, serving the hall stack. Between the hall and inner room is a late 17th or early 18th-century chamfered door surround. The inner room fireplace has a bread oven and a chamfered timber lintel with bar and run-out stops, resting on chamfered timber corbels. The upper storey retains principally 19th-century joinery, including one 18th-century three-panelled door.

The roof structure includes a single raised cruck truss, closed to just below collar level above the hall and passage partition, with trenched purlins, a diagonally set ridge purlin and a morticed and tenoned collar. To the left of the hall stack the roof structure has been replaced; the original timbers, including surviving rafters and battens, are thoroughly smoke-blackened on the hall side and more lightly so over the lower end.