Hall Farmhouse And Adjoining Shippon To East

Hall Farmhouse and Adjoining Shippon to East

Hall Farmhouse is now a house, originally built probably in the early 16th century, remodelled in the early to mid 17th century, with a kitchen range added in the early to mid 18th century and further remodelled in the late 18th century. Some alterations and minor additions were made in the late 19th century. The building is constructed of painted coursed stone rubble rendered to the front, with some cob in the kitchen wing. It has a gable-ended Welsh slate roof, with a separate hipped slate roof over the kitchen range.

The original 16th-century house was a 3-room-and-through-passage house facing south. It was an open hall house, formerly open to the roof from end to end, probably with low partitions. Rooms were floored in stages, with the floor over the inner room jettied into the hall. The hall was probably floored last, although the lateral stone stack to the rear may be slightly earlier. There is an integral end stack to the inner room and a lateral stack to the rear of the lower room. A parallel kitchen range was added to the rear of the hall and inner room in the early 18th century, sharing the hall stack. A staircase was inserted in the wide through-passage in the late 18th century, and the eaves were possibly raised at the same time. In the 19th century, a gabled dairy was added to the rear of the lower room and a lean-to porch over the rear entrance, possibly the remains of a larger lean-to.

The farmhouse is 2 storeys, with an asymmetrical but regular 4-window south front featuring late 18th-century small-paned 2-light wooden casements. There is a late 20th-century glazed door to the right with a 20th-century segmental tympanum, and late 20th-century French casements at the left-hand end of the front. Straight masonry joints in the left-hand gable end indicate a former roof line. The rear elevation has a nail-studded boarded rear door to the through-passage, probably relocated in the porch, and a first-floor 3-light wooden casement above the door. The kitchen range features a pair of first-floor 2-light wooden casements and one ground-floor 2-light wooden casement.

The interior contains a 16th-century 4-bay roof with 3 smoke-blackened 16th-century trusses, possibly jointed crucks, with notched mortice and tenoned apices and trenches for a former diagonally set ridge piece and trenched purlins. Late 19th-century roof construction sits above the 16th-century trusses. An 18th-century 4-bay roof over the kitchen range consists of trusses with principals (including hip principals) and trenched purlins. The hall has a 17th-century chamfered cross beam with scroll stops and a 20th-century fireplace to the rear, probably in front of an earlier fireplace. An internal jetty to the left has a chamfered and stopped bressumer resting on 3 projecting beams with chamfered corners and ends. The inner room has a chamfered spine beam with run-out stops. The lower end room has two ceiling levels and a pair of late 18th-century square-headed niches with shaped shelves and corner cupboards with raised-and-fielded panelled doors. A pegged jointed timber reused as a mantelshelf in a late 20th-century fireplace was taken from the foot of the north principal of the right-hand roof truss, suggesting that the trusses are side-pegged jointed crucks. Late 18th-century internal remodelling throughout the house includes doors of 4 raised and fielded panels and pairs of internal window shutters to ground-floor rooms, each shutter with 2 raised and fielded panels. A late 18th-century staircase was inserted in the cross passage with stick balusters to the landing and tapered square-beaded newels with acorn finials; the foot of the stairs and passageway to the left formerly had doors. A large kitchen fireplace has stone jambs and a wooden lintel, probably with a 19th-century chamfered and stopped surround. An 18th-century winder stair rises from the kitchen, with an old boarded door to a cupboard underneath with H-L hinges.

The adjoining shippon to the east is probably late 18th or early 19th century. It is constructed of coursed sandstone rubble with a slate roof, is 1 storey and loft, and features a central boarded loft door, a ground-floor window with a wooden lintel, and a small vent to the left. There is a half-height boarded door to the left with a wooden lintel, and a door and window in the right-hand gable end, both with wooden lintels. A boarded door is also present to the rear. The interior contains cross beams for the loft (floor removed at the time of survey in July 1987) and 2 trusses with straight principals and collars.