Barfield Farmhouse

Details

DODDINGHURST

TQ59NE OUTINGS LANE
723-1/5/326 (West side)
28/02/85 Barfield Farmhouse
(Formerly Listed as:
OUTINGS LANE
Barfields Farmhouse)

II

Hunting lodge, now house. Early C17, C18, C19 and C20.
Timber-frame exposed and part brick rendered. Roofs peg-tiled.
Plan rectangular containing central timber-framed block with
single room on each floor and stair and symmetrical extensions
to N (timber-framed, C18) and to S (brick, C20) both colour
washed with hip roofs, also C19 timber outshut on N and W
sides. C20 outshut along rear, W side.
EXTERIOR: 2 storeys. Front elevation has centre block with
exposed vertical studs with no bracing, mixture of original
ovolo mullioned windows and C20 wooden, diamond leaded
casements. Framing shows outline of tripartite frieze window
on ground floor and similar continuous window of 5 stepped
units across whole width on first floor. Front door to N end,
C20, boarded with central diamond light with simple C20 gabled
wooden porch. Principal chimney-stack to rear hidden by higher
roof. The 2 extensions have symmetrical ground and first-floor
windows, C20 wooden casements with diamond lights.
The rear, W, elevation is all now C20 with the early block
projecting in the centre with its restored principal
chimney-stack in red brick, stretcher bond. The continuous
outshut has 3 sets of wooden casement windows all with wooden
casements and diamond lattice lights. 4 dormers with similar
windows light the first floor.
INTERIOR: the ground-floor room of the centre block has a
large early C17 fireplace with a timber lintel at the rear.
The outer oak framing has some joints made particularly
strongly with squint shouldered tenons as though to carry
considerable weight. The floors had deep set joists with
diminished haunches and the building apparently had another
storey on top indicated by redundant peg holes in top plates
and the character of the joints in the binding joist of the
upper room ceiling. The N extension is framed in elm and had
floors at the same height as those in the centre and appears
to be modelled on the earlier construction but slender timber
was used with primary bracing. The NW lean-to is in inferior
timber.
The building probably began as a hunting lodge/standing with
the necessary viewing windows. The top floor, now removed, may
well have been partly open as a gallery to look over the
ground dropping to the SE. For such a building a single
ground-floor fireplace would have been adequate. The first
addition to the N may well be connected with a second purpose
that the building may have had. In the partition wall between
the entrance corridor and the ground floor room there are a
series of large peg holes arranged in rows and also on the
front wall of the same room other slots and holes occur. Such
patterns of holes are found fairly commonly in E Anglia and
are thought to be for weaver's warping frames. After being a
hunting lodge the house may have become a large weaving shed,
strong floors and good light making it most suitable. The top
floor was probably removed when the building became a farm and
the C19 outshut added. Similar hunting standings occur at
Chingford, Queen Elizabeth's Hunting Lodge, and at Lodge Farm,
Galleywood, on the other side of the forest of Shenfield.
(RCHM: Central and SW Essex : Monument 9: 57).




Listing NGR: TQ5868799552

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

373611

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Books and journals
An Inventory of Essex Central and South West, (1921), 57

End of official list entry

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