Flemish Cottage

This is a Flemish Cottage situated within an irregular row of buildings. The house dates from the 17th century, with later alterations. It is constructed of rubble stone with close-eaved slate roofs, and features a short stone stack to the right end. The building is two storeys high, and includes a cellar.

The front elevation is irregular, appearing to have roughly three bays, with a projecting gabled crosswing to the right. The crosswing has a blocked, chamfered cambered arch undercroft, the head formed as a single block with a relieving arch, now infilled with a small inserted casement-pair window. Corbelling is above, under a ground floor casement-pair with stone voussoirs. The gable over the crosswing sits below the main range’s eaves. A lean-to projection extends from the centre of the building at ground floor level, with a slate roof half-hipped to the left. This projection has a casement-pair window in its front wall, again with stone voussoirs, and a 9-pane casement in the return wall. To the extreme left is a flat-headed doorway, sheltered by a sloping slate hood, accessed by outside steps and a platform extending across the front of the adjacent building. The entrance door is recessed, with a casement-pair window above it on the first floor. The low-pitched roof has a 20th century eaves board. The right end has a first floor triple casement with stone voussoirs to the left of a raised chimneybreast, likely the chimney for the adjacent property.

The rear elevation features a slit window to the first floor, and, towards the east, a notable Flemish chimney. This chimney comprises a massive rectangular projection with deep, sloping offsets and a D-plan chimney stack, possibly originally circular, with an added flue. A slit window illuminates the fireplace. A door is located to the left.

Inside, stone steps against the south wall lead down to a segmentally-arched undercroft beneath the main part of the house. The undercroft has stone walls and a flattened, pointed vaulted roof with iron rings in the wall, seemingly indicating a former use as a lock-up. It is slightly set into bedrock at the front and almost wholly subterranean at the south end. A segmentally-arched doorway with rough rubble voussoirs, the jamb and head not keyed into the vaulting, was originally present at the bottom of the steps from the ground floor. There is a recess in the east wall, and a blocked, splayed window in the north wall. Original access to the undercroft was from beneath the crosswing, via a short, flat-vaulted passage which is now blocked. This passage led to a second doorway with surviving, chamfered broach-stopped jambs and two steps down into the main vaulted room.