Youth Hostel

Details

SAFFRON WALDEN

TL5338 BRIDGE STREET 669-1/1/20 (West side) 28/11/51 Nos.1 AND 3 Youth Hostel

GV I

Includes: No.1 MYDDYLTON PLACE. House, now youth hostel. Early C16, additions c1600 and early C18, also C18/C19 industrial additions, restoration 1951. Timber-framed, plastered with exposed studs, peg-tiled roofs, red brick stacks. 2 storeys. L-shaped plan to Bridge Street and Myddylton Place with subsidiary brick house in rear internal angle. E front elevation: 4 building units, S-N, (1) corner site, early C16, roof hipped, close studded and jettied round street corner, with angle post and bracket to projecting dragon-beam decorated with folded leaf and moulded capital crested with fleur-de-lys. Although partially cut away by alteration, 2 medieval shop window openings with 4-centred arched heads and decorated spandrels survive. Medieval doorway immediately to N with chamfered frame, pilaster buttresses with capitals on principal bay posts bracketed to jetty, 3 mortices in principal window and doorway posts suggest the former site of an attached street stall under the windows. Bressumer above was embattled, now cut back. First floor, two 3-light casement windows c1900 with glazing bars, each 3x2 panes. (2) unit continuous with (1) but rebuilt, ground floor rendered with original, but reconstructed, rectangular bay window with roll moulded members, 1:4:1 lights, transom, glazing bars, 6x4 panes in all. First floor, jetty joists renewed, thin studding, 3-light casement window similar to those in (1), roof hipped. (3) lower unit (down hill slope), c1600, timber-framed, jettied, plastered, traces of panelled basket pargetting. Ground floor, one C20 2-light casement window, 2x3 panes, one shallow 4-light 3-cant bay window with glazing bars, 4x3 panes, one pane metal with old exterior stay. Principal central jetty joist projects with later applied pilaster capital. First floor, 2 casement window with leaded panes, one 2-light, one 4-light. Stopped gabled roof, red brick stack. (4) lower unit, further down hill, originally a late C16 timber-framed barn of 3 bays with peg-tiled, stopped gable roof. S bay contiguous with (3) enclosed as house in early C18 with doorway having enriched flat cornice hood door of 6 recessed panels, upper 2 now glazed, middle 2 have upper inner shaped corners. Adjacent C18 fixed window with glazing bars, 4x3 panes. First floor, one 2-light leaded casement window, plaster has traces of ashlar lining. Centre of barn unit, high waggon-way up to eave. C20 2-leaf half-height boarded door, adjacent bay to N has full height weatherboarding. S side elevation (to Myddyltyon Place): comprises a long range of 9 bays, 4 extending from Bridge Street (1) and a further 5 further bays (5), approx 28m long continuing the same jettied system of close studding, pilaster buttressed principal bracketed posts. The elevation has 3 external curved wall braces (2 tension and 1 stud). An embattled bressumer sill remains but the decoration is partly cut away. Roof all peg-tiled. 4 E bays (1), E-W, ground floor, angle post, fixed window with moulded architrave and glazing bars, 3x2 panes. Early C18 door in plain door case, door, 6 fielded panels. Inserted frieze window of 3 lights, C16 roll moulded mullions and slender plain intermediate mullions. C19 canted bay window (remnants of medieval pilasters and bracket mortices each side), horned sashes with glazing bars, 1x4,4x4,1x4 panes. First floor, tension braced corner, one 3-light casement window set in aperture of earlier oriel window, 3x2 panes. Range to Myddylton Place, (5). Ground floor, E-W, C19 door, reconstructed with over light, door of C16 arrised, studded boards, reframed and roughly cut to length at bottom. Aerating aperture cut through framing, now with simple glazing but also earlier nailed louvre strips. W end bay, large blocked C16 window with deep sill, 3 lights, roll moulded mullions and jambs, now cut off flat to street, upper part glazed and treated as previous aerating aperture. Adjacent bay to E has curved stud brace. First floor, W end, tension brace. 2 C16 oriel windows and site of another. Complete windows have canted sides, 4 arched lights having projecting roll moulded and shaped corbel sills and roll moulded mullions, C20 glass. Incomplete window has moulded jambs remaining, C20 glass. At attic level, prominent early C19 hoist loft projects on brackets with hipped roof and simple front and E side lights. Rear, W elevation: L shaped, including N elevation of wing (5) to Myddylton Place. Most of the rear rendered with early C20 casement windows with glazing bars. N range, units (3) and (4). Ground floor, 3 casement window, one 4-light, 8x4 panes, one 3-light, 9x4 panes,one 2-light, 6x4 panes. First floor, one 2-light, 6x3 panes, one 3-light, 9x3 panes, one a flat roofed dormer, 4-light, 8x4 panes. N end bay of barn, (4), weatherboarded, internal waggon/carriageway faces weatherboarded with loft doorways. Rooms below entered from carriageway. Elevation of W (5), ground floor, windows, one 3-light, 3x9 panes, one 3-light, 2 lights with louvred glass and one still with 3x3 panes, one window of 2-lights, 6x3 panes with integral adjacent doorway having an over light and plain C20 door. First floor, 2 windows of 3 lights, 9x2 panes, another similar but central C20 fire-door through central light with escape stairs. The SE angle has a pair of brick early C18 houses projecting forward from (5), burnt headers, peg-tiled roof, end and rear stacks. First floor, 3 early C18 sash windows (uneven spacing), slightly inset with thick flat glazing bars, dormer above with hipped gable of 3 casement lights with glazing bars, 3x3 panes. Ground floor, 2 original doorways, paired under long C18 central coved hood (rudimentarily repaired). Doors, one of 4 panels, upper 2 glazed, lower 2 recessed, other has simple upper glazing and rudimentary lower boarding. Window each side of doors, to E, large, square, with moulded C18 architrave, now has C20 glazing, 3x4 panes, to W, C20 3-light casement but in C18 aperture. INTERIOR: range to Bridge Street, unit (2). Ground floor room is principal to building and probably a shortened medieval hall. S end has an early C16 central recess with side recesses all moulded and with rose decorated spandrels. Recess looks like a high end canopy relating to rebuilt window to street but may be a spere frame relating to extant C16 street door. Features now set high above floor level as street level has been dropped. In same room, big mid-C17 eared fire surround with arabesque decorated panel and fluted keystone. Panelling c1600 in same room with similar panel sections used elsewhere in building. Backing ground floor fireplace in unit (3) reworked, some later C16 brickwork, Delft tiles surround C20 inner fireplace. Room has principal late C16 joists crossed in the centre with lamb's tongue chamfer stops. Range to Myddylton Place (5), continues framing from front (1) with corner dragon beam, heavy joisting, principals with reduced centre tenons and scribed shoulders to step-stopped chamfers, common joists flat laid, diminished haunched soffit tenoned. This jointing is advanced transitional construction of the earlier C16 which, together with the exterior stud brace, suggests a date of c1520/25 for the work in ranges (5) and (1). The contemporary wall plates are scarfed with a halved and bridle butted scarf having a slight splay. The roof has clasped side purlins with wind braces. Framing of hoist loft is of simple primary braced type, c1800 and it still contains a hoist wheel mainly of wood. HISTORICAL NOTE: original C16 use of site debated between a merchant's house with long storage range, perhaps including saffron and a possible guildhall, shops being a common feature in Essex guildhalls. The use as a malting probably by early C18 related to unusual inner pair of brick houses constructed then. Simple louvred openings to Myddylton Place presumably made for ground floor malting floors. (Vernacular Architecture Group: Stenning DF: Essex Conference: Chelmsford: 1984-: 40-43; Vernacular Architecture: Stenning DF: Timber Framed Shops 1300-1600: Comparative Plans: 16: 1985-: 37; The Buildings of England: Pevsner N & Ratcliffe E: Essex: London: 1965-: 335).

Listing NGR: TL5357238618

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

370400

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Stenning, D F, Essex Conference Chelmsford, (1984)
Pevsner, N, The Buildings of England: Essex, (1965), 335
Vernacular Architecture in Vernacular Architecture, (1985), 37

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