Upcott Farmhouse

TAWSTOCK SS 53 SW 1/64 Upcott Farmhouse - II

Farmhouse. Probably mid C16, remodelled in early C17 and extended c. 1700 with C20 alterations. Rendered cob and stone. Thatch roof with gable ends. Slate roof to rear service wing. Rear lateral hall stack with tall rendered shaft and rendered stack at left end. Multiphase plan development. Former open hall house, originally 3 room and through- passage plan, the lower end demolished in early C20 and a partition introduced across the through-passage to create a lobby entry, the rear doorway being blocked. There is a second entrance into the inner room which appears to have been abandoned as the parlour c. 1700 when another was added at its left end and a gable ended 2 storeyed service wing to its rear. 2 storeys. 4 window range. C20 fenestration, mainly 2 light casements, 6 panes per light. C20 Doric porch to inner room entrance and C20 door to former through- passage at right end. Interior Chamfered surround to 4 centred arched doorway between hall/through- passage, a plank and muntin screen continuing to its right having been removed, a concealed section to the left uncovered at time of survey. Chamfered cross beam to hall and hollow step-stopped fireplace lintel. Boxed in beam to former inner room. 4 panelled doors from this room to hall and added parlour which has a section of moulded plasterwork cornice surviving to the gable end wall. Old ledged 3 plank door between kitchen/dairy to rear service wing. Interesting roof structure. 2 probably C18 trusses with roughly hewn principals and side-pegged collars to over added parlour end. Over the hall and inner room are two C16 raised cruck trusses with 2 tiers of trenched purlins and ridge purlin and morticed and tenoned cranked collars. The truss over the hall, including the purlins, battens and underside of the thatch is thoroughly smoke-blackened; the cob partition rising to the apex of the roof beteween the hall and inner room is smoke-blackened on the hall side only, and the truss and roof members over the inner room are clean. This suggests the farmhouse was built in a transitional period with the hall still open to the roof, but the inner room ceiled from the beginning. Probably in the C17 the hall itself was floored over; at the same time the ridge was raised when the front wall was built out about a metre from the original line.

Listing NGR: SS5428130972