Details
TQ 4696-4796 LAMBOURNE MARKET PLACE, ABRIDGE,
7/11 Abridge Motor Spares and
Robert Chappell, butcher
GV II*
Hall house, C14, extended in C20, now 2 shops and a house. Timber framed,
plaster and painted brick, roofed with handmade red clay tiles. 2-bay hall
aligned approx. N-S, aspect W, with cross-entry at N (service end missing) and
2-bay parlour/solar crosswing, also C14, at S end, jettied to W. Inserted
chimney stack at S end of hall, serving crosswing also, late C16. Inserted
floor and dormer in hall, early C17. Shop with accommodation over added to N of
hall, on site of original service end, c.1910, jettied to W but roof aligned N-
S. Rear wing from this end, contemporary or later. Single-storey extension to
rear of hall and S crosswing, flat roof treated as a terrace, C20. Rear pitch of
hall roof removed C20, replaced by glazed doors to terrace. Small lean-to
extension at N end, C20. 2 storeys. Ground floor: shop front of glazed tiles
(Robert Chappell, butcher), front of hall of painted brick with dentils below
eaves, plain door and C20 casement window, and shopfront of painted brickwork
(Abridge Motor Spares) with 2 plain brackets and plastered jetty. First floor,
hung red clay tiles on N wing, gabled dormer in roof of hall with C20 casement
window, C20 casement window in S crosswing. Eaves of hall at jetty level,
rafters of W pitch heavily smoke-blackened. Axial beam plain-chamfered with
lamb's tongue stops at both ends, early C17, joists plastered to soffits, lodged
on outer walls. Studs exposed between cross-entry (still in use) and rest of
hall. No other wall,framing or floor framing exposed, but believed to be
substantially present within plaster (doorheads probably missing owing to raised
floor levels). N ground floor hearth reduced for C20 grate but mantel beam
exposed, moulded and carved with shallow foliate design, snake at one end and
cross at the other. The roll-moulding turns downwards at each end, showing that
before the brick stack there was a timber framed chimney in the same position,
the moulding continued down the side posts. Hole for spit mechanism at E end.
Splayed and undersquinted scarf in S wallplate of crosswing. Crownpost roof of
crosswing intact, hipped at rear, gabled at front, plain crownpost with wide
axial braces only. Cl9 cast iron grate reported on first floor of crosswing,
concealed by plaster. This building is of exceptional interest because: (1) it
is one of the few survivors of a type of house formerly common, and frequently
illustrated in the Walker maps, 1584-1615, at Essex Record Office, in which the
walls of the hall were no higher than the lower storey of the crosswing; most
were raised when a chimney and floor were inserted in the C16 (2) it is the
oldest secular building in the parish (3) the frame seems to be largely intact,
except the rear pitch of the hall roof (4) of the unusual carved mantel beam (5)
the positions of the chamfer stops on the axial beam show that the cross-entry
has never passed out of use. Below jetty of S crosswing, a wooden rack with
iron hooks and brackets, associated with a C19 open shopfront for the display of
game, etc, an unusual survival. RCHM 7.
Listing NGR: TQ4663196799
