Old Ansford Inn

Former coaching inn, private house, school, and now converted to five separate residences on Ansford Hill. The building dates from the 17th century with late 18th-century additions.

The structure is built from coursed, squared local Cary stone with Doulting stone and brick dressings. The roof is now clay tile, though it was formerly thatched. Stone slate base courses run to the original 17th-century structure, and coped gables sit at the extremities. Brick chimneystacks rise from the building.

The plan is accretional and multi-phase. The 17th-century part stands one and a half storeys high; the 18th-century additions are two storeys with attics.

The front elevation to the east comprises five bays overall: three bays added in the late 18th century and two bays representing the 17th-century part on the right. The 17th-century bays contain two 19th-century sash windows on the ground floor (one set below an open pediment) and four-light and three-light casements to the first floor. The three left-hand bays, added in the late 18th century, feature sash windows of twenty-four panes with keystones and beaded surrounds at both ground and first-floor levels. Between bays three and four stands an entrance porch with Tuscan pilasters and a part-glazed door with segmental arched fanlight. This porch is a late 20th-century addition, replacing a portico that was dismantled in the 1950s.

The north gable wall has a blocked opening with stone chamfered surround at ground floor and a late 19th-century sash window above. The south side displays a similar range of windows, many with brick segmental arched lintels, and some blocked openings.

The rear west wing has a more functional character, with large blocked openings to the ground floor suggesting it may once have served as a stable or storage range. A vertical joint in the masonry indicates either a westward extension or a raising of roof height. Several casement windows in this wing appear to be later replacements or insertions.

Internally, the earlier part retains 17th-century features including exposed chamfered ceiling beams and the remains of a winder staircase to the first floor. The roof structure in the earliest part has collared trusses with tie beams; one is a closed truss. The roof timbers in the rear wing are partly exposed in the converted attic floor and consist of A-frame construction with principal rafters and dovetailed collars. Some trenched purlins remain despite repairs. Most other internal features date from the late 20th-century conversion and modernisation.

The Old Ansford Inn appears on a map of Castle Cary dating to around 1687 and was licensed as an inn until 1878. It was associated with the diarist Parson James Woodforde (1740–1803), who frequented the premises during the 18th century and referred to it in his published diaries, which provide insight into 18th-century rural England.