Arden House and Old Hall (formerly Arden Cottage)

Arden House and Old Hall (formerly Arden Cottage)

Two row houses of 16th-century date with alterations dating from the 18th and 20th centuries, and a rear wing added in the early 18th century.

The building is constructed of random limestone rubble with ashlar chimneys. The front is roofed in Cotswold stone slate with concrete tile to the rear.

The plan consists of a rectangular main range fronting the street and running north-east to south-west, with a rear wing extending from the southern end.

The main elevation is of two storeys with an attic, divided into six uneven bays. Towards the centre is a four-centred arched 16th-century doorway opening into a through passage. The doorway has a chamfered opening and hoodmould with Tudor rose stops and contains an ancient plank and iron-studded door. The rest of the front elevation shows numerous records of alteration. A single-storey canted bay window to the right, with mullioned casements, dates from the early to mid-17th century. Two pairs of 20th-century six-over-six-pane sashes stand to either side of the doorway in an area of ground-floor rebuilding that followed the removal of earlier shop fronts. Three early-19th-century twelve-pane sashes occupy the upper floor, with a tripartite sash to the left, all set into a plain ashlar band close to cill level. The right-hand house has two gabled dormers with 20th-century casements. The main range terminates in parapet gabled ends with chimneys having plain caps. The rear wing presents a north-facing front dating to around 1710, with five windows all set within segmental arches with moulded keyed architraves and bull-nose sills to the upper floors. The upper windows are six-over-six sashes with thick glazing bars. Below are mixed openings: two six-over-six-pane sashes in square-headed openings; a segmental-arched former doorway with a timber cross-window; and a stone cross-window with ovolo-moulded mullion and transom fitted with leaded iron casements. The left doorway has a three-panel fielded door with a rectangular light over. The rear of the main range features a gabled stair turret with a lower gabled projection to its left.

Arden House at 13 High Street occupies half of the main range and the entire rear wing. The ground floor of the main range is a single room with an exposed chamfered and stopped beam. Between the windows is a blocked three-centred arched doorway (not visible from the exterior) with a small late-18th-century decorative plaster motif of vine and barrel set in the impost, possibly indicating an earlier use as a vintner's shop. This room and those in the rear wing are fitted with classical stone fire surrounds featuring reeded uprights and bull-nose motifs. The staircase is early 18th-century, a closed string design with turned balusters and newels and ramped handrail, rising through both storeys to the attic. The rear wing retains panelled doors from the 18th and 19th centuries, and the first-floor rooms have shutters and panelling to the window reveals. In the attic, trusses are closed to partition the space into rooms accessed by a corridor running under the northern slope of the roof. The truss at the top of the stairs is closed to collar level by reused rectangular-framed panelling, possibly moved from elsewhere in the house.

Old Hall at 15 High Street, formerly known as Arden Cottage, is contained wholly within the main range and is entered through a doorway at the rear of the through passage. The door dates from the 18th century but is a recent introduction brought from elsewhere. The cloakroom door is an early-20th-century Arts and Crafts example in plank and batten with decorative ironwork, typical of the Minchinhampton area. The ground floor displays massive exposed chamfered and stopped beams and exposed joists, with a later partition creating a small kitchen towards the rear. At the northern end, the large fireplace has 16th-century monolithic stone fireplace jambs and a plain timber bressumer now covered by an imported timber carving. The cellar, lined in rubble stone, is accessed by a short flight of stone steps. A blocked segmental archway formerly led to Arden House, and a blocked chute once connected to the street. The enclosed dog-leg stair rises in the stair turret at the rear of the range. The first floor contains three rooms around the landing, with exposed chamfered and stopped beams throughout and wide elm floorboards. The northernmost room has a small Tudor fireplace in stone with moulded and carved decoration. Set higher in the wall is a small spice cupboard with moulded oak surround and butterfly hinges; its door is impressed with a large X, serving as an apotropaic (evil-averting) mark. This room and the one to the south have panelled window seats. The attic has a plastered ceiling.

The roof structure to both ranges is largely exposed. The roofs date from the 18th century, with that to the rear wing being earlier than the replaced roof over the main range. Both roof structures are formed from A-frame trusses with twin purlins. The replaced roof over the main range has slightly cranked collars.