Week Farmhouse

Farmhouse. It has origins dating back to the 16th century, with improvements made in the 17th and early 18th centuries, and modernization and rearrangement in the mid- to late-19th century. The external walls are plastered cob on stone rubble footings, with stone rubble stacks topped with plaster and brick. The hall stack includes a granite ashlar chimneyshaft, and the roof is slate, formerly thatch.

The original layout was a three-room-and-through-passage house, extended in the 18th century to four rooms facing south. To the left (west) is a parlour with a gable-end stack, representing an addition to the smaller inner parlour. The hall has a central axial stack backing onto what was formerly the passage, and to the right (east) is a service end kitchen with a projecting gable-end stack. In the 19th century, the kitchen was refurbished and the lower passage screen removed. A passage was inserted through the upper end of the hall to a new stair turret projecting to the rear. Originally, the house was an open hall house heated by an open hearth fire. The hall fireplace was likely inserted in the late 16th century, and the house was gradually floored over in the late 16th and 17th centuries. The present appearance is largely the result of substantial early 18th-century and mid- to late-19th century refurbishment. The house is two storeys high.

The exterior has an irregular five-window front with 20th-century casements with glazing bars. The original passage front doorway is towards the right end, while the new main front doorway is roughly central. Both have mid- to late-19th-century plank doors, the latter behind a 20th-century gabled porch. The roof is gable-ended.

Inside, the kitchen appears to be a complete 19th-century rebuild, featuring crossbeams and a brick-lined fireplace of that date. The hall fireplace is blocked, but its large size is evident and the fireplace and its oak lintel are intact. The crossbeam is stop-chamfered with run-out stops. A decorative 18th-century cupboard is set into the rear wall, featuring a curving back, shaped shelves, and a fielded nowy-headed door. At the upper end of the hall (now beyond the 19th-century passage) is a 16th-century oak plank-and-muntin screen, which was moved a short distance into the inner room around 1980. No original carpentry detail is exposed in the former dairy or parlour, and the parlour fireplace is blocked by a 20th-century grate. A 19th-century stick baluster main stair has been installed. Much of the roof dates back to the early 18th century, supported by A-frame trusses with pegged lap-jointed collars. However, the roof over the hall is older and includes an early 16th-century face-pegged jointed cruck truss, showing signs of smoke blackening from the original open hearth fire.