Moorhall Farmhouse

Reasons for Designation

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Details

WHITBOURNE

815/0/10027 Moorhall Farmhouse 18-MAY-10

II A farmhouse, built in the late-C17 with additions and alterations dating from the later-C18 and C19 and C20. The building has a timber frame with wattle-and-daub and brick infill and a gabled roof of plain tiles. It has two storeys and originally had three large rooms to each floor with a central and two gable stacks. In the C19 a series of service rooms for the farm were added along the north side beneath a catslide roof.

EXTERIOR: The south, entrance, front walling at ground-floor level has been largely rebuilt in C19 brick laid in English garden wall bond. Above this there are 14x2 frames of small framing with angle braces to the left corner and at right of centre. Above this a further row of cells has been added in the late-C18 or early-C19 and the pitch of roof on this side has been made more shallow. The six-panelled C19 door is to left of centre and the ground-floor casements of three lights are all of C20 date. On the first floor there are early-C19 casements of two lights at right and of three lights to the left, set higher in the wall. The western gale end has a chimney to the centre. The render has been partially removed at south of the chimney breast, showing brick to the ground floor and cells of framing to the first floor as well as clear evidence of the raising of the roof, including the original principal rafter set at a steeper pitch. The eastern gable end is rendered and has an outshut to the ground floor. To the left of this is a projection at ground-floor level, partially rendered and of coursed sandstone rubble and probably formerly a bread oven. To the rear, northern, side are extensive outshuts with catslide roofs and at right of this is a single-storeyed, gabled projection.

INTERIOR: The present entrance hall appears to have been the kitchen originally. It has a sizeable hearth with ingle-nook and a cross-axial beam with steep chamfers which has meat hooks to both sides. There are long, diagional passing braces to either end of the northern outer wall of the original building. C19 fittings at ground-floor level include terracotta floor tiling, six-panelled doors and joinery in the present dining room, which perhaps formerly functioned as a parlour, including fitted cupboards and an alcove. Both staircases date from the C19. At first-floor level the timber frame is evident in the external walls, where jowled corner posts with angular tops can be seen, and in the dividing walls, one of which has a heavy, cranked tie beam and carpenter marks. There is a wind brace to one corner of the roof on the northern slope. Wide floorboards exist in two of the rooms and there are cast-iron, ducks-nest grates with plain wood surrounds to two of the bedrooms.

HISTORY Moorhall Farm stands in open countryside near Bromyard. Characteristic features of the farmhouse such as the pegged small framing combined with long passing braces, the squared tops to the jowled posts and the deep chamfer to the cross-axial beam in the former kitchen space, indicate a date in the late-C17. The original wattle and daub infill was largely replaced by red bricks in the C18 or C19 and then rendered. At some stage in the late-C18 or C19 the roof was raised on the south front by one row of small framed cells and at the same time this front was re-fenestrated and the building was given a new front door. Matching joinery was added to the ground-floor parlour at the south-western corner.

Reasons for Designation: Moorhall Farmhouse is designated for the following principal reasons:

* Architectural: The house has a C17 timber frame which is largely intact. * Intactness: The original plan, although altered, can be read without difficulty. * Evolution: Additions and alterations made in the C19 give a clear impression of evolving farming practice at the time and of the gentrification of a vernacular building.

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

506883

Legacy System:

LBS

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