Barns Green Village Store, Barns Green, West Sussex

Summary

An early-C19 range of cottages, altered in the later C19 to include an integral village shop, and in the mid-C20 to form a single house and extended shop. The mid-C20 shop extension is not of special architectural or historic interest.

Description

An early-C19 range of cottages, altered in the later C19 to include an integral village shop, and in the mid-C20 to form a single house and extended shop.

MATERIALS: rendered walls, and mixed stock brick, under a clay tile roof.

PLAN: the house has a principal W facing elevation, with a centralised C20 porch and entrance. The rooms are mainly situated on the western front of the house, and all are accessed by rear N/S passageways on the ground and first floors. To the south, the building has an attached mid-C20 single-storey rectangular shop extension*.

EXTERIOR: the principal W elevation is two-storey, and of eight bays. It is formed by the front face of the former cottages. From the N, all bays have flush fitted C20 multi-paned timber casement windows, apart from the fifth, which has a C20 gabled porch, and entrance door of vertical plank construction. The roof is clay tiled and has three internal chimney stacks which rise through the ridgeline. The central stack has two chimneys. The ground floor of the two southernmost bays is enclosed by the mid-C20 shop (which does not form part of the listed building).

The rear, E elevation of the house is predominantly of C20 date and characterised by a projecting single storey extension of mixed stock brick in Sussex bond, with attic dormers. Although it does not add to the special interest of the building, it is carefully detailed and integral to its current plan and form. All fenestration in the extension is C20 timber multi-paned casements. The roof is clay tiled and follows the pitch of the original to form a catslide. There are eight bays in total; the central six made up of the extension, and at each end of the elevation, a single bay of the original two-storey rendered rear wall is visible. To the S end, the original bay has a horned sash window of four panes to the first floor, and C20 metal casement window below.

INTERIOR: the central hall of the house is double-height with a dog-leg C20 timber stair to the N, which terminates at the rear of the house onto a galleried landing. The landing has a timber-framed ceiling and runs the length of the rear of the house. At the rear of the hall on the ground floor there is another passageway which provides access to all the ground floor rooms. On the ground floor there are two rooms either side of the hall and the room to the N has an inglenook fireplace constructed of large mixed stock bricks in an English bond. There is a curved bressumer above and a brick bread oven to the side. This room also has an exposed timber ceiling frame formed of narrow axial floor joists. The room to the S has the vestiges of an inglenook, again with curved bressumer, but with a later brick fireplace surround. This room has a single central beam running N to S. The other ground floor sitting rooms are plain, apart from the northernmost, which has a square brick C19 fireplace. The first floor rooms are also plain, bar the northernmost room which has an early-C20 small brick fireplace, and a central room that has a beam running W to E. There some C19 plank doors throughout the house which may have been repositioned, and most window openings have exposed timber lintels. In the SE corner of the building at ground floor, the original external walls have been opened up and the opening for one of the original W-facing cottage entrance doors is intact. Above this area the timber-framed ceiling of the terrace is visible, including a large chamfered beam running E to W.

* Pursuant to s1 (5A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 (‘the Act’) it is declared that the mid-C20 shop extension is not of special architectural or historic interest.

History

The Barns Green village store is believed to have originated as a row of early-C19 cottages, and now comprises a single house and attached C20 shop. The 1-inch Ordnance Survey (OS) map of 1813 shows a building or buildings on the site of the Barns Green village store, and it is therefore possible that some of the present structure predates the C19. The Tithe map of 1840 shows more clearly a long rectangular run of cottages, similar to the current footprint. The apportionment records of 1840 note that the cottages were the property of William Dendy, who also owned the adjacent C17 Bricklayer’s Arms (re-named the Queen's Head by 1852). By 1895 there was a post office recorded in Barns Green and this along with a historic photograph suggests that it has always been housed within the Barns Green village store. The photograph, which probably dates from the late C19 or early C20, shows the southern end of the range of cottages in use as a shop and post office. The 1911 edition of the OS map suggests that by this date, the shop footprint has been extended further S and W.

Sometime after the Second World War, the cottages to the N of the shop were converted in to a single dwelling. Some of the original door openings were converted to windows, and one became the principle entrance. The room behind this entrance then became a double-height hall, and the cottages were connected via a rear passage. An extension was also built across the rear elevation. Much of the current shop was constructed in c1950 as a substantial extension to the original footprint, since which time it has had a number of alterations resulting in its late C20 character.

Reasons for Listing

Barns Green village store, an early-C19 range of cottages, now a single house with attached village shop, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* Architectural interest: the house retains much of its rhythm and character as a terrace of early-C19 cottages;
* Interior survival: the plan-form of the terrace remains legible internally, and notable features include the brick built fireplace with timber bressumer and bread oven, along with the visible floor frames, and structural timbers;
* Historic interest: in its early form and subsequent evolution, the building reflects aspects of the changing pattern of rural domestic buildings from the early C19 into the C20.

External Links

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