Barnes Place

Details

HADLOW THREE ELM LANE, GOLDEN GREEN TQ 64 NW 6/106 Barnes Place 20.10.54

GV I

Large farmhouse. Early C14 with a series of improvements through the C15, C16, and C17, some C19 and C20 modernisation. Exposed timber framing, most of the ground floor level has been underbuilt with C19 Flemish bond red brick with some burnt headers, rear of main block is clad with C19 scallop-shaped tiles; brick and sandstone stacks with brick chimneyshafts; peg-tile roof.

Plan and Development: L-plan farmhouse. the main block is set back from the lane and faces north north west, say north. It has a 2-room plan with a 2- storey service outshot on the left (east) end. The left room of the house is a parlour with a projecting gable-end stack. To right is a large entrance hall with an axial stack towards the right end. Direct entry from front into the entrance hall and main stairs rise against the back wall alongside the stack. At the right (west) end is the 3-room plan parlour crosswing. It projects to rear and very slightly forward. Main parlour at the front with principal bedchamber above with projecting outer lateral stack. Service rooms to rear now used as offices. Single storey kitchen block projects backwards in the angle of the 2 wings. It has an axial stack between the main kitchen and small unheated rear room.

This is a house with a long and complex structural history. Its present layout has evolved through successive building phases. The main block was built in the early C14. The present main block was a medieval open hall house, open to the roof and heated by an open hearth fire. The entrance hall was the hall itself. There is evidence for a closed truss at the right (west) end. There was probably a 2-storey solar end beyond which was replaced by the present parlour crosswing. At the other (eastern) end of the hall there is a spere truss indicating that the room beyond was the service end and also open to the roof. This end now is the result of a C19 modernisation; it is not possible to determine when the spere truss was closed and that end floored over. The parlour crosswing was added in the late C15/early C16. A 2-storey wing with the first floor open to the roof and the stack probably dates from this time. The first floor chamber was originally jettied at the front. At the same time the closed truss was altered and a moulded dais beam inserted. The main block was originally wider than it is now. It was narrowed, probably in the early/mid C16 when a timber-framed stack was inserted and the hall floored over. The flooring may have been in 2 C16 phases. The layout of the beams might indicate that there was first a gallery across the rear but the whole flooring is in a very similar style. From the beginning there was a staircase basically where there is one now. Parlour crosswing was refurbished in the late C16/early C17. The kitchen block is C18 or C19 but there is no sign of an earlier kitchen.

Main house is 2 storeys with attics in the roofspace.

Exterior: Attractive building. Asymmetrical 2:3:1-window front. The 2- window section to left is to the outshot. Most are C20 casements, a couple with glazing bars but most with rectangular panes of leaded glass. 3-bay main block has central doorway; C20 part-glazed door with side lights. To left a late C19 casement with margin panes and to right a late C19/early C20 window with pointed arch head. Main block framing is large framing with secondary straight tension braces. Mortises in the central bay suggest there was once a projecting bay window there. The main block roof hips down slightly to the lower parlour crosswing roof to right and is gable-ended to left. The outshot is set back with a lower roof, gable-ended with a lean-to on the end. The crosswing roof is gabled to the front and hipped to rear. The front end is close-studded above a moulded bressummer at first floor level. The western front has a 1:2-window front interrupted by the large stack. Its base is sandstone blocks laid to rough courses, brick above with tall divided diagonal chimneyshafts. All the first floor windows are C20 casements with arch-headed lights and the contemporary window ground floor front has a pointed arch head. All windows this side have leaded glass panes, mostly diamond panes. The brick kitchen wing projects back further than the crosswing and on the inner side has a C20 projecting porch, its gable above eaves level. The back of the main block includes a late C19/early C20 pointed arch head window with Y- tracery to the hall and C19 French window with'margin panes to the parlour. 3 gabled dormers in the main block roof and C20 half dormer to the outshot.

Interior: Exceptional. The main block includes the extensive remains of the C14 house. Hall roof is 2 bays, carried on the remains of a large arch-braced base cruck truss. Chamfered arch brace is evidently a cruck post reused when the building was narrowed. Octagonal crown post and 4-way curving braces. Even below the attic ceiling the crown post is smoke-blackened from the original open hearth fire. Both ends of the hall arcade posts are exposed at first floor level. West end front post has a curving windbrace from post to arcade plate and others show evidence for 2 sets of arch-braces in each spere. On the hall side the posts are chamfered with the remains of moulded capitals. Both end trusses have plain crown posts with curving down braces. At least one of the arcade plates continues east of the hall but it is plastered over. A large horizontal plate is exposed at first floor level in the east wall but is too low to take the arcade plates.

The posts of the western closed truss now sit on a secondary dais beam moulded with beads and a coved hollow chamfer. The hall fireplace is brick with a plain timber surround. The first floor structure appears to have been altered a little in the C19. This appears to be a C17 rebuild of a C16 timber-framed stack but the rear part appears to be C16. All the beams and joists are chamfered with step stops. Stairs from ground to first floor are C20 but the plain stairs up to the attic rooms are much earlier and lead to C17 and C18 doorways. Little carpentry is exposed in the main block parlour, the chamber above or the hall chamber since all are still as they were refurbished in the mid C19. Hall chamber has a good C19 iron grate and chimneypiece.

West end of the hall includes paired blocked doorframes to the parlour crosswing. Parlour has unchamfered crossbeam and joists and a large stone ashlar fireplace with Tudor arch head and moulded surround. Similar fireplace to great chamber. Chamber has 2-bay roof over. Tie beam and wall posts are hollow-chamfered and formerly arch-braced. It also appears to have had a crown post but roof replaced in late C16/early C17 with clasped side purlin construction with queen struts.

Barnes Place is an important and well-preserved medieval house containing good but modest work from most subsequent building phases. It also forms part of a good group of listed buildings at the eastern end of the hamlet at Golden Green.

Listing NGR: TQ6459248116

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

179542

Legacy System:

LBS

End of official list entry

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