Narracott Farmhouse

Narracott Farmhouse

This house, now divided into holiday cottages, is a former farmhouse of mid-17th century date, possibly with an earlier core, extended in the mid-19th century and renovated in 1982. It stands on a south-west-facing slope near Budbrook Lane at Drewsteignton.

The building is constructed of plastered cob on a stone rubble footing, with stone stacks in the older part featuring granite ashlar chimney shafts and brick stacks to the mid-19th century extension. The roof is slate, originally thatch over the 17th-century section. The structure is 2 storeys throughout and forms an L-shaped plan.

The original farmhouse, the lower block facing south-west, was built with a 3-room-and-through-passage plan. An inner room parlour occupied the uphill north-west end with an end stack. The hall contained an axial stack backing onto the former passage, though the front door is now blocked. The service end room had an end stack, now axial, backing onto an unheated fourth room added in the mid-19th century.

In the mid-19th century, a new parlour wing was added at right angles in front of the former inner room parlour, facing south-east. This contains an entrance hall and parlour with a projecting end stack. The parlour wing has a regular but unsymmetrical 3-window front of large 16-pane sashes beneath low segmental arches, with the original panelled door and narrow overlight at the right end. The low-pitched roof over this section is hipped at both ends. The older block has an irregular 3-window front of 19th and 20th-century casements with glazing bars and a hipped roof to the right. The rear elevation displays an irregular 5-window front of 19th and 20th-century casements with glazing bars and two 20th-century doors, including the passage rear doorway.

The interior retains significant mid-17th century carpentry, though much is covered with mid-17th century plaster. Each of the three main rooms features a crossbeam clad with plaster, including an ovolo-moulded cornice. The hall contains a deep moulded frieze of leafy arabesque. The hall and service room fireplaces are blocked, but the parlour fireplace is exposed, constructed in granite ashlar with an ovolo-and-hollow-chamfer moulded oak lintel with scroll stops. During the 1982 renovation, "sgraffito" plasterwork was removed from the fireplace, and an ornamental heraldic plasterwork overmantel was removed for conservation by the Royal Albert Memorial Museum in Exeter, awaiting re-erection as of 1986.

The only exposed carpentry visible is a plain oak plank-and-muntin screen on the lower side of the passage. All three first-floor chambers have ogee-moulded plaster cornices, and the roof truss principals, apparently A-frame, are boxed in. In the service end room chamber, the cornice breaks forward around an encased roof truss and is enriched with moulded leaf scroll decoration.

Although Narracott Farmhouse appears to be of a single constructional phase, it may incorporate earlier features. The survival of mid-17th century plasterwork throughout the house is most unusual, though its relative plainness places it at risk of being overlooked or disregarded.