Bridgetown Farmhouse And Garden Wall Immediately To North East

Bridgetown Farmhouse and Garden Wall

This farmhouse originated in the early 16th century, with possible alterations during the later 16th and 17th centuries, and a later 19th-century addition. The walls are rendered cob and rubble, with a gable-ended thatch roof. Brick stacks are positioned at the right gable end and the gable end of the rear wing, while a projecting rendered rubble lateral stack stands at the front.

The original building followed a 3-room and through-passage plan with the lower end to the left. It began as a 2-room structure with a central passage, with a hall to the right open to the roof and heated by a central hearth. The lower end appears to have been rebuilt around the late 16th century as a 2-storey range, separated from the hall by a solid full-height wall. The hall was ceiled in around the early 17th century when a front lateral stack was also added. An inner room was probably introduced at this time, along with a fireplace and newel stairs at the gable end of the lower room. A wing, possibly for service purposes, was constructed behind, extended in the 18th century as a farm building but later demolished. In the later 19th century, a parlour wing was added behind the passage.

The exterior is 2 storeys with 3 storeys to the rear wing. The front is asymmetrical with three windows: C19 3- and 5-light casements, with leaded lights to the left-hand ground-floor window. The first-floor right-hand window has an arched head with gothic tracery glazing. A 20th-century lean-to porch with a part-glazed door stands to the left of centre. Behind it sits a 19th-century gothic tracery part-glazed door in a 17th-century ovolo-moulded wooden door frame. The rear elevation features a 17th-century chamfered wood mullion window on the first floor to the left, with a 19th-century wing to the right of centre.

The interior contains several significant carpentry details. The lower room has a 17th-century ovolo-moulded wooden doorframe from the passage, wooden newel stairs adjoining a blocked fireplace with wooden lintel, and an early 17th-century chamfered doorframe that formerly led to the rear wing. The doorway to the stairs and the cupboard to the left of the fireplace retain 17th-century 3-plank doors with the central plank recessed. The hall features an early 19th-century panelled full-height built-in cupboard with dentilled cornice and probably an 18th-century bench along the higher end wall. The inner room has a chamfered axial beam, and another 17th-century chamfered doorframe survives on the first floor.

The roof structure is of considerable interest. One pair of cruck-type timbers survives, one appearing to have a face peg very low down. Over the lower end, separated from the hall by a full-height cob wall, the roof is clean with a late 16th or early 17th-century truss featuring a cranked collar halved onto it and a threaded ridge. The roof over the hall is smoke-blackened, with a truss having a morticed, cranked collar, threaded ridge and purlins. To the higher side of this truss the rafters and thatch are heavily smoke-blackened. Immediately below this truss, another truss is positioned against it with crossed apex and lapped collar, also slightly darkened by smoke. The roof over the inner room is clean with no truss but has heavy purlins.

The listing includes a rubble garden wall immediately to the front of the house.