Heles Tenement And Adjoining Barn

A house and adjoining barn, likely dating from the mid to late 17th century, with later 20th-century alterations and additions. The house is constructed of cob on a stone rubble plinth, with the front rendered. It has a gable-ended roof covered in corrugated asbestos (formerly thatched). A rendered axial stack rises from the centre of the building. The original plan was of a two-room design, aligned approximately north-east/south-west, facing south-east (where the ground slopes to the left). Initially, a larger principal room (the hall) was on the right, with an axial end stack, and a smaller, unheated room on the left, divided axially. A dairy was located to the rear and a staircase at the front. Late 20th-century alterations included the removal of internal partitions and the staircase at the left-hand end. A new front door was inserted into the right-hand room, accompanied by a lean-to porch.

Adjoining the house on the right is a barn dating from the late 17th century, featuring central opposed doorways (now blocked to the rear) and formerly a lean-to addition at the front. The house is two storeys high. The front elevation has an asymmetrical arrangement of three windows. It features 19th and 20th-century two-light wooden casements, with the left-hand first-floor window blocked. A late 20th-century porch with a 20th-century plank door is situated between the first and second windows from the right. A blocked doorway is visible between the first and second windows from the left, indicated by lines in the render. The barn has a wide doorway (without doors in January 1988) with a wooden lintel. A 20th-century trefoil-headed ground-floor window is inserted in the left-hand gable-end of the house, incorporating reused 19th-century stained glass, reportedly originating from a church in Henley on Thames, Berkshire. A blocked wide doorway is located at the rear of the barn.

Inside, the right-hand ground-floor room (the hall) retains 17th-century chamfered joists spanning front to back, and an open 17th-century fireplace with stone jambs, a chamfered wooden lintel with straight cut stops, a bread oven with a 19th-century cast-iron door, and an old cooking frame. An old plank door to the right of the fireplace, leading to the barn, is fitted with wrought-iron strap hinges. A window seat is present in front of the window. Partitions were removed at the left-hand end in the late 20th century.