Orchard Cottage

Orchard Cottage is a house dating from the late 17th or 18th century, situated in Cornworthy. It is constructed of roughcast stone rubble with a thatched roof, featuring gabled ends. The rear wing has a hipped roof. The house has rendered stacks, one at each gable end, with slate weathering; the stack on the right-hand side projects slightly. A lateral rendered brick stack is located on the outer right hand side of the rear wing.

The house’s overall plan is L-shaped, with a two-room front range. A central entrance passage leads through to a rear staircase. The larger left-hand room was likely originally the kitchen with a lower floor level, and each room is heated by a gable-end stack. The single-storey wing behind the right-hand room is likely integral and was perhaps originally unheated; it now has a lateral stack on its outer right side. An outshut at the rear of the main range appears to be an addition from the late 18th or early 19th century. A single-storey addition was built in the mid to late 20th century, filling the space between the outshut and rear wing.

The front elevation is asymmetrical with three windows. The upper floor has two-light casements dating from the late 19th or early 20th century, while the ground floor has two two-light casements dating from the 19th century, both with glazing bars. A 20th-century panelled door is situated in a small, gabled brick porch to the right of the centre.

The rear elevation features a single-storey rear wing to the left with a hipped roof and a large 20th-century casement window in the end wall. The main roof slopes down over the rear outshut. A mid to late 20th-century single-storey flat-roof addition fills the space between the rear wing and outshut.

The ground floor of the main range was inspected and both rooms contain blocked fireplaces. The left-hand room exhibits exposed rough joists, while the right-hand room has a roughly chamfered cross-beam. The staircase at the back of the passage is a 20th-century addition. The roof structure was not inspected.