Easton Farmhouse

Easton Farmhouse

A farmhouse dating from the early 17th century with 18th and 19th century additions and alterations, located at West Alvington. The building is constructed of slatestone rubble walls, roughly coursed on the right-hand part of the main range and porch. The roof is covered with natural and asbestos slates, gabled at the right-hand end and rear wing, hipped to the left and half-hipped to the stair wing at the rear. There are brick axial stacks and a rendered brick stack at the right gable end and to the rear wing, with a rendered stone axial stack and brick shaft to the left.

The original plan consisted of two rooms and a through passage with a small stair wing at the rear of the passage. The larger room to the left probably functioned as a hall or kitchen, heated by a large fireplace in its end wall. The smaller right-hand room contained a fireplace backing onto the passage and may have been a parlour. A small wing at the rear of the passage continues to attic height with a winding stair at the top, originally probably containing a similar or dog-leg stair below, now replaced by a 19th century staircase. Out shuts to either side of this wing were probably added in the later 18th or 19th centuries. In the early 18th century the house underwent minor internal remodelling, and a further unheated room was probably added at the left-hand end. Behind this room a service wing extends to the rear, partly rebuilt earlier this century.

The exterior presents two storeys with an attic to the right-hand part of the house. An asymmetrical five-window front features 19th century two and three-light casements. Two-thirds of the way along the front to the left is a vertical straight joint; the ground floor window beyond it has a brick arch above. To the right of centre is a tall gabled two-storey porch with a round-arched doorway formed of stones set on edge. The inner doorway behind has a 17th century wooden ovolo-moulded doorframe with bar stops, containing a heavy studded oak plank door. To the right of the porch the eaves are higher with two dormer attic windows. The rear elevation has a tall shallow wing to the left of centre with a 17th century ovolo-moulded two-light wooden mullion window at the top and a 19th century transomed casement below, with outshuts to either side and a wing projecting forward from the right-hand end.

Internally, the left side of the passage is divided by a late 19th or 20th century tongue and groove partition, which replaces an earlier wooden screen as evidenced by the headbeam above. The room to the left contains two ovolo-moulded cross beams and a wide fireplace with a similarly decorated wooden lintel and dressed stone jambs, featuring two ovens. An early 18th century two-panel door opens from this room, whilst six-panel 18th century doors access the rear of the passage and the right-hand room. The right-hand room has a fireplace with dressed stone jambs and a wooden lintel, recently replaced after the fireplace had been broken through to create a doorway. On the first floor, another six-panel door opens into the left-hand room, which contains two 18th century two-panel cupboard doors and a contemporary fielded panelled surround to the window with a window seat. The far end bedroom has a small 18th century cupboard with panelled doors in its front wall and an earlier cupboard adjoining the chimneystack with bolection panelled doors. In the rear wall of the landing near the stairs is a 17th century chamfered doorframe with a cranked head and contemporary studded door, opening into a small room integral with the stair wing.

Over the original house are four pairs of principal rafters, and one pair over the stair wing. The principal rafters over this wing and the two over the centre part of the house have curved feet. All trusses have trenched purlins and collars halved and pegged onto the principals, which are morticed at the apex. Despite the original house comprising only two rooms, the quality of its features is notably refined. The subsequent extensions have not diminished its character, and the building preserves good quality joinery of differing periods throughout its interior.