The Wern

The Wern

This house displays the characteristic layout of a medieval timber-framed building with later modifications. The north elevation reveals the early structure most clearly: an original long range with an added cross-wing at the upper end, and a gabled extension housing a lateral fireplace in the hall. The cross-wing retains a fully box-framed gable with queen strut truss, though some timbers have been cut away for window insertions. Brick infill panels fill the frame. A three-light window is offset to the left at ground floor level, with two pairs of two-light casements above, the right-hand example lighting the staircase. Later lean-to additions obscure the return elevation's construction. To the right of the cross-wing, an asymmetrical gable serves the hall fireplace, with small windows flanking the stack. The stack itself shows eighteenth-century brickwork, raised in the nineteenth century with red brick and blue brick capping. A partly modern lean-to wraps around the right side of this chimney extension. The adjacent section of the main range is brick-built with an axial stack featuring ramped brickwork at the base and paired flues with capping brick similar to the hall chimney. A blocked window at mid-height reveals a visible timber wall-plate above the brickwork. The return gable-end is asymmetrical with brickwork that appears later, probably nineteenth-century, though the stone plinth likely belongs to an earlier construction phase.

The south elevation was extensively altered when the house was first divided into two cottages and later reunited into a single dwelling. Windows are largely modern insertions, but the elevation's layout reflects the late nineteenth-century cottage division and suggests a simple domestic gothic style, with outer gables at either side (the right representing the cross-wing) flanking the long range, a modern gabled porch, and two tall gabled dormers.

The plan comprises a three-unit main range articulated by three cruck trusses, with a cross-wing at the upper end built in box-frame construction. The main range contains a single-bay hall with an axial fireplace set forward from the front wall. A cruck truss rises above a box-framed partition separating the hall from the middle unit, possibly indicating the subdivision of a once-larger hall. A further cruck truss is positioned approximately 1.5 metres inward from the box-framed end wall of the cross-wing—an unusual spacing that may suggest the cross-wing replaced an earlier in-line bay and that this truss marks the division between hall and passage. The hall ceiling features a longitudinal beam with plain chamfers and stop-chamfered joists. Plain run-out stops finish the chamfered bressumer above the fireplace. Exposed timber framing in the cross-wing displays square panel framing of substantial scantling. The early seventeenth-century staircase, fully framed within the wing, features shaped principal newels with finials and square secondary newels, shaped splat balusters, a moulded rail, and a closed string. The two units below the hall, though modernised, retain cruck trusses in their dividing walls. The unit immediately below the hall clearly shows evidence of a later roof-line and features a straight collar with a possible king post, though partially obscured. Beyond this, the third cruck truss and purlins bear mortices suggesting missing wind-braces. The truss over the hall displays chamfered principals visible within the hall and a cambered and chamfered collar visible upstairs—decorative details suggesting it once stood as an open truss over the hall before the hall was ceiled and the cross-wing constructed. The lower section of the truss visible in the hall is morticed as for a missing tie beam, but this may indicate either a spere truss or the position of a missing screen partition.