Highstead Farmhouse

Highstead Farmhouse is a house that formerly served as a farmhouse, dating from circa 1500 or slightly earlier, with alterations and additions made in the later 16th and 17th centuries, further modifications in the 19th century, and additional work in the early 20th century. The walls are of cob, refaced with rubble at the front and sides. The roof is gable-ended and thatched, with three brick stacks—one at each gable-end and one axial lateral stack to the rear outshut.

The plan is complex and has developed considerably over time. The house currently comprises three main rooms with an entrance into a stair lobby and a passage to its left. The original building began as an open hall house with a central hearth. Due to lack of access to the roof spaces over the hall and the left-hand end of the house, evidence for the original divisions is limited. A full-height partition divides the roof space over the hall from that at the right-hand end, though this does not appear to be original; the hall roof is likely smoke-blackened. The left-hand end is more problematic as there is no access to its roof space, though an early doorway survives on the first floor, opening onto a room over the hall with a different floor level, suggesting the hall was floored over at a different time. The solid wall dividing this room from the hall indicates it may have been an original or second-phase chamber accessed by ladder from the hall. The ceiling over the lower end is at a different level from that of the hall, indicating the hall was likely floored over last, probably in the early 17th century.

The lower end stack was inserted not at the usual gable-end position but set in to form a narrow room at the very end of the house. Possibly when this stack was inserted, a newel stair was added in a projection to its rear. The inner room has a fireplace at its gable-end, likely a later insertion. An unusual feature is the presence of a stack at the lower side of the putative passage, currently without a fireplace but possibly constructed to serve one on the first floor.

Further alterations were made probably in the 19th century when the stairs were inserted and a passage made behind the hall leading to the rear part of the inner room, which had been subdivided. The passage also served a kitchen added in a lean-to at the rear of the hall. At this stage the house was probably refronted in stone rubble.

The exterior is two storeys, with an asymmetrical five-window front. The left-hand half projects slightly and has early 20th-century two- and three-light casements. The right-hand side has two single-light 20th-century casements to the right and a three-light 20th-century casement to the left on the ground floor. Above it is an early 19th-century 16-pane sash with a later 19th-century 12-pane sash to its left. At the left end of the recessed section is a gabled porch with a 19th-century glazed and panelled door. The rear elevation has a rectangular stair projection towards the left-hand end with a large 19th-century outshut to its right.

The interior is of good quality. The room to the right of the entrance has a fireplace with a chamfered and step-stopped wooden lintel and a chamfered ceiling beam. The small room beyond it has a fireplace using the same stack with a narrow chamfered wooden lintel. The newel stairs have been removed from their projection. The hall has a chamfered ceiling beam with indistinct stops. Its fireplace is blocked but a chamfered wooden lintel is visible. To the front of the stack is a massive wooden post apparently supporting a cracked ceiling beam. To the rear of the hall stack, now in the separate passageway, is what may be an original wooden doorframe—four-centred with a small peak in the head forming a kind of ogee. On the first floor is a contemporary or earlier 16th-century round-headed chamfered door frame. The room over the lower end has vestiges of a 17th-century partition at one end.

The roof over the hall shows a cruck truss visible on the first floor, though without access to the roof space, evidence of smoke-blackening is not available—though it is highly likely to survive over the hall. Over the lower end, two original trusses survive with a complete smoke-blackened roof including battens and thatch. The ridge is diagonal, the purlins trenched, and the collar halved with a notched lap joint to the surviving complete truss. The other truss has had the stack inserted into it.

This is one of the few medieval houses surviving in this area and one of the most complex, containing very interesting internal features as well as an attractive facade.