Higher Cruft Farmhouse

This is a farmhouse, likely dating back to the 17th century, with possible earlier origins, and an addition from the 18th century, along with 20th-century alterations. The construction combines stone rubble and cob walls, predominantly rendered, and is roofed with slate and corrugated asbestos. There are three chimney stacks: one of stone rubble with a slate dripcourse and a brick shaft at the right gable end, another rear lateral stack of stone rubble and dressed granite with a brick shaft on a stone rubble base at the gable end of the rear wing, and a third, unspecified type.

Original plans show a longhouse-like layout with a shippon at the lower end, a through-passage, a hall, and an inner room above the hall to the left. The separation between the passage and shippon is minimal, and it is unclear if they were originally connected. The hall had a rear lateral stack for heating, while the inner room had a gable-end stack. Around the early 18th century, a kitchen wing was added to the rear of the hall and inner room, and a 19th-century outshut was added adjoining the kitchen wing at the higher end. In the 20th century, the internal room arrangement was slightly altered, and the rear passage door was blocked.

The house appears asymmetrically with a four-window front, built down a slope with the shippon at the lower right end, and a projecting central section. Most windows are 20th-century casements and lack glazing bars, with the exception of two first-floor windows on the right-hand side, which are 19th-century two-light casements with small panes. A 20th-century part-glazed door is situated to the right of centre. The shippon has a ground-floor door towards the lower end, a first-floor loading hatch, and a ground-floor window to the left. At the rear, the kitchen wing projects and is flanked by an outshut. A lean-to is attached to the left end of the shippon.

The interior roof timbers, according to the owner, consist of roughly straight principal rafters with lapped and pegged collars, thought to be from the 18th or 19th century. The original hall fireplace is blocked but may have retained a former open hearth, and includes a chamfered cross beam with straight-cut stops. The inner room has a fireplace with an ovolo-moulded wooden lintel featuring ogee stops, and a ceiling beam with a narrow chamfer. A blocked wooden mullion window of at least three lights is visible externally on the rear wall of the inner room, now contained within the 19th-century outshut. The kitchen fireplace has a roughly chamfered wooden lintel. The shippon retains its original rough, heavy cross beams.