Smallacombe Farmhouse

Smallacombe Farmhouse is a farmhouse with origins dating to the late 16th century, significantly remodelled and reoriented in the early 18th century. The construction is primarily of stone rubble, with brick dressings, though mistakenly described as a brick building by Nikolaus Pevsner. The roof is slate, gabled at the ends, with brick cornices, and the gable ends are slate hung.

The original west-facing 16th-century house was rebuilt in the early 18th century with an east-facing entrance. A single 16th-century doorway remains at the rear, and a lean-to addition to the south, featuring a 16th-century doorway and two mullioned windows, may represent the remains of a former south cross wing. Little of the earlier house is visible above ground floor level.

The main 18th-century block now has rear outshuts on either side of a two-story projection with a hipped roof to the rear; this projection may have initially served as a staircase but is now ceiled over at first floor level. The symmetrical east front has three windows, arranged symmetrically, with a central two-leaf panelled door beneath a flat-roofed porch canopy supported by granite columns. The porch is likely a 20th-century addition. Two ground-floor windows feature thirty-six panes and crown glass, possibly replacements from the early 19th century. Three narrow first-floor windows, each with eighteen panes, are present, the central window being boxed. To the south end of the lean-to is a pair of two-light granite mullioned windows with timber casements and iron stanchions. A hollow-chamfered arched granite doorway with pyramid and ball stops is located on the west end of the lean-to. The ground was levelled during the 18th-century rebuilding, resulting in a significant portion of the original south cross wing being buried below the present ground level. The hipped rear projection includes two 20th-century buttresses and a probably re-sited moulded granite arched doorway with carved spandrels, within a square-headed architrave.

Inside, a remarkable feature is the exuberant plaster ceiling on the first floor of the rear projection, likely dating to the first decade of the 18th century. The design appears to celebrate a military victory, possibly associated with the War of the Spanish Succession. A central winged figure within an oval moulding likely represents victory, and may have originally been blowing a trumpet. Surrounding the oval are cherubs' heads, wreaths, and foliage, the leaves being free-hanging. The ceiling is coved below the central design, with scallop shells containing grotesque heads derived from “green men” and trails of flowers and leaves in two corners. In the opposite corners are two plaster figures of grenadiers, one apparently lighting a grenade, surrounded by military trophies, including cannon and breast plates. The ceiling sustained some 20th-century repairs following damage caused by a falling cat. Kathleen and Cecil French proposed that the ceiling was the work of a local craftsman influenced by 1697 Dutch plasterwork at Bowringsleigh. An 18th-century dog-leg staircase has slim turned balusters, a flat moulded handrail, and a timber lattice dog gate. Two-panel doors are present, some featuring low middle rails.