Crab Mill

Crab Mill is a long two-storey range built largely of local brick, though differences in colour and bonding indicate several phases of construction. The roof is now corrugated sheet, covering remains of pegged slate-work visible inside. The building comprises two lofted cow-houses to the left and a dwelling to the right.

The dwelling has axial and right-hand gable stacks. Its front elevation features a doorway beside the central stack, with a window to its right in a camber-headed opening (the window detail has been lost). Two further windows to the right are now boarded over, with smaller openings above; one of these retains remnants of a two-light casement. The gable end and rear elevation incorporate some sandstone rubble masonry. The rear has a doorway with cambered head and an adjacent window in the central unit, with a further window on each floor to the right.

To the left of the house, the first cow-house has doorways at each end, both apparently inserted. A camber-headed opening of an earlier doorway is visible immediately left of the right-hand doorway, and a blocked window to the right of the left-hand doorway has a similar head. There is a diamond vent at the centre and three similar vents above, with a loft opening offset to the left. The rear elevation has two tiers of similar vents. The further cow-house to the right has red sandstone rubble masonry to much of the ground floor and a doorway with cambered brick head to the left. A small loft opening sits above. The rear is blind but has a continuous brick band in the upper storey.

The house follows a three-unit plan. The cruck trusses that originally flanked the hall now form the end wall to the left (between dwelling and cow-house) and the partition between the second and third units to the right. A central truss is believed to have existed but was removed when the brick chimney stack was inserted. The left-hand truss formed the passage partition and has a single central doorway with a shouldered moulded 'Caernarfon' arch. Above the tie-beam, the partition has a central post to a slightly cambered collar, on which the stump of a possible king-post sits. The panels have brick infill replacing the original wattle-work.

The dais partition has outer doorways with mutilated remains of chamfered arched heads, probably also of 'Caernarfon' type. Above the tie-beam, paired posts are jointed to an arched collar with a distinctive steep apex. Both trusses are truncated at the apex, associated with the reconstruction of the house to a higher roof line in the early 19th century if not earlier.

Following insertion of the chimney stack, the central bay became the main living room. It has a large fireplace with heavy timber bressumer and remains of a bread oven. The right-hand room has a smaller fireplace and a partial cellar towards the rear. This cellar is red sandstone-walled, apparently of a piece with similar walling forming the sill of the cruck-framed partition. A blocked doorway under this partition suggests the cellar may once have extended under the hall. Fragments of earlier framing appear to have been re-used as beams within the house, including lengths of purlin with mortices for wind-braces.

The interior of the cow-houses is largely modern, though a large blocked opening in the dividing wall between them has a heavy timber lintel, perhaps re-used.