Pwll

Pwll is a very small cruck-framed farmhouse with walls of random rubble, timber-frame and brick, now painted white, roofed in modern red clay pantiles with a half-hip at the north-west end, and a short square rubble chimney. It has three main bays on a north-west to south-east axis, facing south-west, with a chimney stack at the junction of the second and third bays and a cross-passage on the south-east side of that. The building is of one low storey with a loft.

The south-west front features a square-headed doorway offset to the right of the chimney, with heavy oak jambs and a mason-mitred lintel. Immediately to the left, on a plinth about three-quarters of a metre high, stands a cruck-stud with the exposed end of a cruck-tie in its top right corner. At the junction of the first and second bays is a similar cruck-stud likewise on a plinth with the exposed end of a tie in its top right corner. The plinth continues across the hall-bay as far as the north-west side of the chimney-wall, carrying a sill-beam tenoned into the foot of the cruck-stud to the left, and five relatively thin studs. The first two studs are more widely spaced and linked by a rail forming the head of a renewed two-light window. The first bay to the left is narrow and entirely rubble-built, containing a small renewed two-light window. To the right of the doorway, the third bay has a slightly lower plinth and five slightly taller and broader studs, with a mid-rail between the third and fourth forming the head of a small one-light window. In the north-west gable is an exposed cruck truss, underbuilt with rubble up to the tie-beam.

The rear wall has its lower half of rubble (the plinth) and upper portion now of brick, with the exposed ends of cruck-ties at the junctions of the bays. It features a simple wooden doorway to the cross-passage, a renewed one-light window to the left, and a renewed two-light window to the hall-bay. In the roof above is a renewed flat-topped dormer window, and to the left are two small skylights.

Towards the rear end of the cross-passage is a doorway to the hall-bay with a massive square-headed wooden frame, chamfered and mitred, containing a Tudor-arched doorhead. The jambs incorporate a rebate and draw-bar slot. In the hall-bay, the chimney-stack, which infills the cruck-frame, contains a fireplace approximately two metres wide with a chamfered left jamb and a massive oak lintel. To the left of the doorway is an inserted winder staircase built when the upper floor was inserted. This is carried on four lateral beams, chamfered with ogee stops, the ends supported on half-beams along the side walls.

Just behind the beam at the north end of this room is the tie-beam of the second cruck truss, with the foot of the east blade mounted on a high masonry plinth. Less than half a metre behind the cruck-tie is the original dais partition of broad feather-edged boards, which has at the right-hand end an original shouldered head worked in the head-beam. The room behind, which is narrow (approximately 2.2 metres), has a raised stone-flagged floor. Its ceiling appears to have been renewed, but at the time of the Royal Commission survey in 1989 it was reported to be "of post-and-panel construction cantilevered over the head-beam of the dais partition and locked against a rebate on the underside of the cruck tie"—indicating not only that the partition was contemporary with the cruck frame, but that the cantilevered portion of the loft floor had formed a dais canopy.

In the attic, the top of this cruck truss has a king-strut to a collar, and a wattle groove in the top of the tie-beam shows that the truss was originally closed at this level. Heavy smoke blackening on these timbers shows that the hall must have had an open hearth until the chimney stack and upper floor were inserted in the 17th century.

The Royal Commission report suggests that the third bay, beyond the cross-passage, might also have been lofted; but heavy alterations in the past and recent renovation have made it impossible to determine this question.