1, The Quell Cottages

1, The Quell Cottages

A timber-framed house on Quell Lane in Lurgashall, originally comprising two cottages. The building dates from the 17th century with later alterations. A mid-20th century porch is not of special interest.

The exterior is a single-storey-and-attic structure with two bays and a rebuilt central brick chimney stack. The roof is half-hipped and tiled with a catslide to the rear. The timber frame, which rests on a Wealden sandstone plinth, is visible on the ground floor of the north-east and south-west walls, where there is a single large principal post and secondary posts of more slender scantling with nogging in a mixture of brick and stone. The upper storey is tile-hung. A mid-20th century porch on the south-west front shelters the modern front door. The main north-west front is faced in Wealden sandstone and brick with tile-hanging above. The rear wall is a mixture of brick and stone, the brickwork probably no earlier than the 19th century. The windows are all casements, some in timber and others in metal. The north-west front has two gabled dormers, one retaining some diamond leaded panes. The back door is plank panelled.

The interior plan comprises two front rooms which share the central stack and smaller ancillary rooms to the rear. The floor level steps down to the rear of the building, indicating the former extent of the cottages before an outshut was added. Part of the former external wall is traceable, with a large corner post and quite closely-studded timbers on a wallplate and plinth. Two former door steps in well-worn red brick indicate where the two original cottages may have been entered. The floors in the two principal ground floor rooms are paved in brick. Both rooms have timber bressumers to the fireplaces, which contain later grates and surrounds. The principal beams are in situ with chamfers and run-out stops. Upstairs, the floor boards and a short run of balusters to the landing appear to be Victorian in date. There may once have been a second stair next to the present stair giving access to the northern parts of the upper storey when the house was two separate cottages. The king posts of two of the roof trusses, corner posts, wallplate and tie beams are visible upstairs. The doors throughout are timber, plank panelled and ledged, with original pintle hinges.

A subsidiary outbuilding to the south-west has a stone and brick plinth, timber frame and cladding in large timber planks. It is single storey with a pitched tiled roof. Inside, crude partitions made of split tree trunks divide it into two sections, one with a simple loft.

The house appears with its current footprint on the tithe map of around 1840 and on subsequent Ordnance Survey maps. Those dated 1875 and 1912 suggest it originally formed two cottages. The tithe map also shows a second building nearby, likely to be an outbuilding or barn, which appears on the Ordnance Survey maps and is now either demolished or subsumed into a larger house. A second outbuilding—a timber-framed animal shed—is located to the south-west of the house and appears on the Ordnance Survey maps only, not on the tithe map. The addition of a bay to the rear seems to have occurred not long after the house was constructed, as it is also timber-framed. The house has subsequently been refronted in brick, tile-hanging and stone at a later date.

The building is of architectural interest as a 17th-century house with a significant proportion of its original fabric surviving, including the timber frame, brick floors and plank-panelled doors with original hinges and handles.