Hayne

House, disused at time of survey in 1985. Built circa 1810 in the Picturesque Gothic style, with the house completed circa 1865 according to White. Hayne was the seat of the Harris family from the 16th century until 1864. There is a tradition that the right-hand (north) end of the house incorporates part of the pre-1810 Harris manor house. The building is constructed of stone rubble brought to course with slate roofs with hipped ends concealed by parapets. Gothic style rendered brick chimneys with paired octagonal shafts and corner buttresses with set-offs rise to tall gabled pinnacles with finials.

The house is approximately rectangular in plan, arranged around a central stair hall lit from above. The principal elevation faces north east, and the house is built into the slope of the land at the south and west. Unusually thick walls and some slate floors at the right-hand service end suggest that part of the pre-1810 house may have been adapted as the service wing of the new house. The circa 1865 work externally appears restricted to minor alterations to the main entrance and possibly to the right-hand service end. The 1810 design features pre-archaeological Gothic timber and stone panel traceried windows, a battlemented parapet and buttresses with set-offs.

The house is two storeys with a nine-window approximately symmetrical front divided into five bays. The central three bays are broken forward between diagonal buttresses, with the middle entrance three-window bay slightly set back. A hollow chamfer and bead string course below the battlemented parapet changes to a hollow-chamfered string in the outer right-hand bay, which has an angle buttress at its right-hand end. A diagonal buttress sits at the left-hand end of the left bay. The central entrance is an arched half-glazed front door with cusped timber tracery in the head, flanked by buttresses (probably from the circa 1865 work) with similar buttresses flanking the central bay. Two-light timber traceried arched windows flank either side of the front door, with three two-light stone arched traceried windows to the first floor. The battlemented parapet is carried on shallow corbels to the central bay. The bays to the right and left of the entrance bay have two-light stone traceried windows with square heads and hoodmoulds with moulded label stops. The outer left-hand bay has one- and two-light timber traceried windows in rectangular architraves. The outer right-hand bay has two-light stone traceried windows with hoodmoulds with moulded label stops to the ground floor only.

The south east elevation is gabled to the front at the right-hand end and has a wide three-sided entrance turret to the ballroom at the left-hand end. Fenestration comprises two-, three- and four-light timber panel traceried windows, with first floor windows arched. The south west elevation has the ground floor concealed by the slope of the land and a grand four-light four-centred arched timber traceried window lighting the ballroom, flanked by paired buttresses with set-offs terminating in tall pinnacles. Other windows are two- and three-light with timber tracery in rectangular architraves. The north west elevation features a first floor oriel window with diamond leaded panes and a projecting stair turret with a pyramidal lead roof that rises above the main roofline.

Interior: The house shows considerable survival of ambitious Gothic fittings. The notable central stair hall contains an imperial stair with Gothic balusters and wreathed handrails. The first flight leads up to a long landing, lit from above, to the ballroom. The landing has open Gothic timber screens at each end, each with three cusped arches below trefoil-headed arcading. The main entrance hall has a chimney piece, doors and plasterwork of circa 1810. The ballroom wing retains chimney pieces and grand decorated ribbed plaster ceilings enriched with foliage motifs, bosses and pendants. A ground floor room to the left has a timber cornice decorated with carved flowers. The ornate ceilings of the ballroom wing probably post-date 1810.

In the early 19th century Hayne was the site of some consciously antique ceremonials recorded by J.B. Wollocombe in his history of Stowford parish. A quarry in a part of the grounds known as "the Wilderness" was adapted as a picturesque meeting room for the local hunt, and a stretch of ground to the south east of the house is said to have been used for archery. Hayne was purchased by the Blackburn family in the 1860s and Wollocombe describes some of the alterations to the house in the late 19th century. Pevsner attributes the 1810 build to Sir Jeffry Wyatville, though Hayne does not appear in Robinson's catalogue of Wyatville's works.