Details
BRENTWOOD
TQ5793 WEALD ROAD, South Weald
723-1/16/298 (South side)
21/10/58 The Tower Arms Inn
GV II
Public house. Dated 1704. Red brick with chequered burnt
headers, hipped, peg-tiled roof with deep modillioned eaves
cornice and prominent stacks on end walls. Rectangular plan.
EXTERIOR: 2 storey and attics. N front elevation, 5 bays with
string course between ground and first floors and chamfered
plinth. Central front door and pedimented dormers with
casement windows, 2x3 panes, over bays 2 and 4. All other
windows are C19 mullioned and transomed casements with glazing
bars, 2x3 panes, gauged brick voussoirs, shaped over central
first-floor window. Front doorway, panelled pilasters with
capitals, pulvinated frieze cornice, hood on carved console
brackets, lugged architrave, door with 8 panels, lower 6
fielded, upper 2 now glazed. Above, datestone, initials, L
above, AA below and 1704. S, rear elevation rendered and
colourwashed, 5 bays, all windows have early C18 frames with
moulded architraves and mullions and transoms with C20
replacement casements with glazing bars, 4x6 panes. Ground
floor, central doorway , flat hood on shaped brackets, door, 4
lower flush beaded panels, upper 2 glazed. To W deep C20
ground-floor extension. To E window with lower casement now
plate glass. First floor, 4 symmetrical windows and a central
stair window dropped to half storey height, 2 gabled dormers
in bays 2 and 4 with 2-light casements, 4x3 panes. E end
elevation, brickwork and roof as front, central C19 door with
wooden porch, door, 2 lower flush, beaded panels, upper 2
glazed. First-floor window above, C19 2-light casement set in
C18 aperture, with central glazing bars, 2x2 panes. Large
central stack above with 2 recessed panels. W end elevation,
bricwork and roof as front, 3 bays with 6 symmetrical window
apertures with gauged brick voussoirs, outer 4 blind, inner 2
blocked, early C18 stack as on E elevation, but upper part is
C20 rebuild, more slender and plain.
INTERIOR: original central dogleg, close string staircase and
dado, with ground-floor stair arch, with shaped handrail,
rises to attic, balusters alternating, turned and twisted. 2
ground floor rooms at W end with original panelling. S room of
pair has original fire surround with well moulded lugged
architrave. A photograph, kept at the inn, taken about 1903
shows the original casement windows with small leaded panes.
Luptons (qv), Wealdcote and granary (qv), The Cottage (qv),
The Post Office (qv) and the Tower Arms form a group.
(RCHM: Central and SW Essex : Monument 10: 217).
Listing NGR: TQ5713993798
