Beverley Cottage

Beverley Cottage is a semi-detached cottage adjoining Cotswold Cottage, dating from the mid-17th century with extensions added in the 19th and 20th centuries.

The cottage is constructed from squared and coursed local limestone under a Cotswold limestone slate roof, with stacks of limestone ashlar and brick. The 20th-century extension is built of natural limestone under a pitched roof of natural slate to the front elevation and reconstructed slates to the rear.

The house is roughly L-shaped on plan, with a double-depth range running north-south and an additional bay to the east. It rises to one-and-a-half storeys and attic, with large dressed limestone quoins and swept valleys to the roof. The main elevation features a single 17th-century bay to the left, with a steep gable and half dormer. Three-light ovolo-moulded mullioned windows with hood moulds appear on the ground and first floors, with a similar window to the right return and a smaller timber casement with hood mould above. The 20th-century bay to the right is set back and slightly lower, containing a wide entrance doorway, a small gabled half-dormer and a two-light mullioned window with hood mould. The gabled right return of the extension has patio doors and two first-floor windows. To the rear, a 19th-century gabled bay stands to the right with a lean-to extension below, while the 20th-century bay to the left has a gabled half-dormer and a square bay window beneath.

The interior of the 17th-century house contains a single ground-floor room with deeply chamfered beams featuring large double-bar stops, running through a 19th-century partition to the original rear wall. A dog-leg stair rises to the first floor, where a similar ceiling beam runs through the landing and bedroom to the front. The 19th-century wing contains a kitchen on the ground floor and a bedroom above. The 17th-century section includes an attic room with exposed trenched purlins with chamfers and runout stops. First-floor doors throughout the 17th and 19th-century sections are 19th-century ledged and braced examples.

A late 19th-century outbuilding of local limestone stands to the north of the cottage, one of a back-to-back pair that originally provided facilities for both Beverley Cottage and Cotswold Cottage.

Beverley Cottage originated as a single-cell cottage in the 17th century, initially single-depth on plan and rising to two storeys and an attic. In the later 19th century, a two-storey gabled bay was added at right angles to the rear. In the late 20th century, a further bay was added to the east, clasping the end of the existing house, with a small lean-to section running across the 19th-century rear bay.

The cottage retains a high proportion of its 17th-century fabric, including decorative ceiling beams, ovolo-moulded mullioned windows and its original roof structure. The 19th-century extension enhances the earlier building and demonstrates the house's evolution. Although substantially extended in the 20th century, the later addition does not encroach significantly on the plan form or fabric of the 17th-century house, with its scale and materials remaining sympathetic. The building has group value with the attached Cotswold Cottage and the adjacent Pool House.