Howick Farmhouse

Howick Farmhouse is a largely vernacular building, dating back to the 16th century, with significant alterations in the 17th and 19th centuries. The house is constructed from random limestone rubble with a Welsh slate roof. The original core of the house, forming the main front, is a two-room plan with a cross-passage and a small closet and garderobe wing at the rear. In the mid-17th century, a further room was added to the left, featuring a large lateral stack on the rear wall. Later additions include a Victorian kitchen wing, a rear wing – possibly a dairy – and a modern conservatory.

The main elevation presents three bays, with the left-hand bay representing the 17th-century addition. The ground floor features two plastic windows on the left, a two-light Tudor window to the left of the doorway, which is a Tudor doorway with a four-centred head (thought to have been relocated from the east gable), a 19th-century plank door, and a 20th-century steel casement window on the right. The first floor has two plastic windows, a two-light and a three-light Tudor window. The attic has three gables; the first with a three-light plastic window, and the remaining two with two-light Tudor windows. These gables were added in 1884, though the Tudor windows themselves are likely to be reused from elsewhere in the building. Coped gables, a small ridge stack in the cross-passage position, and a larger one on the right gable are present. A gable stack from the kitchen wing projects forward on the left. The left gable end has three modern windows, while the right gable end has a first-floor window that may have been inserted later and a Tudor garret window above. Two small windows illuminate the firestair on the right. The rear elevation incorporates a two-light Tudor window over a six-over-six pane sash, a single-light Tudor window over the rear cross-passage door, a projecting gabled bay in two parts (the older section retaining an original first-floor window in the garderobe and a modern window in the closet, with the ground floor now covered by the conservatory), a 17th-century two-flue external stack with diamond-set shafts at the top (the right-hand flue resting on corbels), and a modern two-light plastic window over a three-light one.

The interior retains numerous period features. The original cross-passage plan comprises a room on either side, with an additional room from the 17th century added to the left. The screen wall between the cross-passage and hall has been altered and its original layout is now difficult to determine, featuring two doorways, one of which is modern. There are two spiral staircases with stone-framed doorways, shaped doorheads, and moulded frames in both stone and oak. C17 plank doors are present, along with several fireplaces of different dates. The ceilings are beamed, displaying bar-and-runout and lambs-tongue stops to the chamfers. Two A-framed roofs are visible, with six trusses in the Tudor section and four in the 17th-century section; the Tudor trusses are all numbered with carpenters' marks. The alteration to the front building line in 1884 is clearly visible. The kitchen wing has an A-frame roof of thin scantling.