Apsley House

A house with an attached former malt house, later a dairy and now a shop, was built in the mid- to late 17th century. Fragments of surviving timber framing suggest possible origins as early as the late 16th century, with an early to mid 18th century refronting of the main house and a late 18th century extension to the malt house. 19th-century chimneys and a Welsh slate roof complete the structure.

The house is two storeys with an attic, and the main range is single-depth. A three-storey malt house projects forward towards the road. The west front has a three-window arrangement of 12-pane sash windows, all with keyed architraves, except for the original doorway on the left, which has a recessed cavetto moulding. The doorway has a flat timber porch hood. The front gable of the malt house features a parapet with a finial and pigeon holes with moulded perches in the apex. A middle-floor doorway with a timber lintel and glazed door is accessed by a straight flight of concrete and stone steps. The top floor of the entire range is a 19th-century addition.

The south side of the malt house exhibits brickwork on a stone plinth with stone quoins, indicating a shorter original building detached from the house. The older section has a three-light casement window on the ground floor and a two-light window on the upper floor, both with chamfered stone mullions and hoods. A two-light window to the attic lacks a hood. An addition to the east has a segmental arched casement window on the middle floor. The north side features casement windows to the ashlar wall of the malt house, with indications of alterations similar to those on the south side. Moulded parapet gables at the ends of the house have chimneys with paired shafts and molded caps. There are two single-light casement windows with hoodmoulds to the upper floor and attic, along with a two-light window to the ground floor at the south end, all with recessed cavetto mouldings. Modern casements with timber lintels are present in the rear wing, built with coursed rubble masonry from an early 19th-century rebuilding. A Gothic window with intersecting glazing bars has been inserted into an earlier opening at the east gable end.

The interior features an early 18th-century staircase with turned balusters, molded handrails, and strings. Stop-chamfered spine beams have run-out stops. The malt house attic once had a concrete floor. The interior is generally very altered, with a much-repaired 17th-century principal rafter roof and a 19th-century roof on the wing. The building’s complex history makes it difficult to interpret, but its principal character is now 18th and 19th century.