Red House Farmhouse

Red House Farmhouse

A house, formerly a farmhouse. The building originated as a 15th-century long house, which was altered in the late 16th or early 17th century, with minor later modifications.

The walls are constructed from haematite rubble, rendered with a thin coat of plaster. The roof has been replaced with 20th-century tiles, replacing the original thatch. Two brick chimney stacks have been rebuilt in the 20th century: a central ridge stack and a west gable end stack.

The south front is a two-storey, end-gabled range of five framed roof bays, with later raised eaves. The west and east gable walls have been rebuilt, probably in the 19th century. At the east end of the south front there is a single-storey lean-to under a catslip roof, which may be the remains of a wing. A small single-storey lean-to built against the west gable wall is not of special interest.

The plan comprises three units with a cross passage entered from the south between the west and central rooms. The original 15th-century range was open to the roof except for a loft in the west bay. In the late 16th or early 17th century, floors, stairs, and a chimney stack flanking the cross passage were inserted into the central room.

The south front entrance has a late 20th-century door. Late 20th-century wood casements occupy earlier openings with timber lintels on both sides; the larger window to the right has 17th-century ashlar jambs with bead mouldings. The first floor has three 20th-century wood casements in earlier openings with timber lintels: the left and right casements have two lights each, and the central casement has a single light.

The rear north wall retains a former doorway to the cross passage, now blocked in its lower part with a 20th-century window in the head of the heavy timber doorframe. At the east end is a doorway with a heavy timber frame and stable doors. The west gable wall contains a 20th-century casement in an earlier opening with a timber lintol. The east gable wall has two-light casements on each floor.

Interior

The central room features a late 16th-century inglenook fireplace with a broadly chamfered stone frame and an outer chamfer to the right-hand pier, with worn base stops to the vertical chamfers. A late 16th-century winding stair stands to the right of the chimney, with a doorway to the passage flanked by solid baulk steps. An inserted cross-beamed ceiling of six panels has deep chamfers to the beams.

The west room contains a central chamfered bridging beam with scrolled stops and a beam chamfered on the inner side close to the gable end wall, now partly enclosed within the later inserted gable end chimney stack. This chamfer has run-out stops with steps. A later inserted bridging beam stands close to the partition with the cross passage.

The first floor retains partly exposed 15th-century roof trusses. At the west end is a closed truss with the beam cut for a doorway to the end room from a corridor on the north side. The end room was originally a loft, closed off by a framed partition with a small blocked doorway at the south end where the soffit of the truss tie beam is trimmed for the chamfered curved head of a doorway arch; pegged mortices for door posts remain on either side. The second truss is a plain raised cruck, and the third bay is a raised cruck with an arch-braced cambered collar with chamfers to both faces of the arch. The fourth truss has a tie beam and collar and closes the altered fifth roof bay.

The wall on the lower purlin on the north side is chamfered in the third and fourth bays, with similar chamfered upper purlins in the same bays to both sides. The wall purlins on the south side were removed when the roof was raised. Wind braces in two tiers on the north side are visible in the third bay.

The third and fourth bays formerly contained the open roof of the 15th-century hall. The fifth bay, over the east rooms, probably served as the parlour in the 15th-century house but later became a byre with an upper floor approached by a stair at the south end; the upper floor is closed from the lean-to roof by a timber partition. The fifth bay was remodelled in the 19th century.