Description

UPOTTERY
ST 10 NE
6/98 Gordhayes Farmhouse
22.2.55
GV II
Farmhouse. Early-mid C16 with various later C16, C17 and early C18 improvements and
alterations, modernised circa 1970. Local stone and flint rubble including sections
of cob, parts are plastered; stone rubble stacks topped with C19 brick; thatch roof.
Plan and development: the main block faces south-east and has a 3-room-and-through-
passage plan. At the right (north-east) end there is an inner room parlour with a
gable-end stack. Next to it is the hall which has an axial stack backing onto the
passage. At the left end is an unheated service room (now used as a kitchen) and
there is a one room dairy block projecting at right angles in front of the service
room.
The roof structure shows that the original house was open to the roof from end to
end, divided by low partitions and heated by an open hearth. The inner room was
probably floored first but this end has since been rebuilt. The hall stack was
inserted in the late C16-early C17. The hall was floored over about the same time
or maybe a little later. There was a major refurbishment in the early C18. At this
time the inner room was lengthened and it was rebuilt as a parlour. The hall was
downgraded to a kitchen and given a large oven, the housing of which projected into
the passage, probably blocking the front end of the passage. The passage screen was
moved a short distance into the passage and the service end was rebuilt. The dairy
block was probably added at the same time. It has now been brought into domestic
use. In the C19 passage was restored when the old oven in the back of the hall
fireplace was demolished and a new oven built in the side of the fireplace, its
housing projecting outside. The house is 2 storeys throughout.
Exterior: irregular 1:2-window front of circa 1970 iron-framed casements without
glazing bars. The passage front doorway is left of centre (alongside the dairy
block). It contains a C20 door. Alongside to left is an older sidelight containing
rectangular panes of leaded glass. To right of the door is the oven projection.
The eaves are carried down as a hood over the sidelight, door and oven housing. The
roof of the main block is half-hipped to left and gable-ended to right. The dairy
block roof is gable-ended. There are similar iron-framed C20 windows around the
house except to rear of the hall where there is a C17 oak 4-light window with
replacement chamfered mullions.
Interior: the service end has a roughly-finished crossbeam and the passage lower
side screen has been stripped of plaster to reveal a plain frame of slender
scantling. The hall has a large fireplace with limestone ashlar jambs and a
chamfered oak lintel. The crossbeam is chamfered with step stops. The partition
between the hall and inner room parlour has been removed although there is still the
headbeam of an oak plank-and-muntin screen left there. There is no exposed beam in
the inner room parlour. The parlour fireplace is early C18 brick with curving
pentan (back) and plain oak lintel, (there is a smaller version in the chamber
above).
The roof was extended both ends of the main block in the early C18 but most of the
original remains. It is a most unusual roof for its date. It is a series of A-
frame trusses. These trusses, the common rafters and underside of the original
thatch is heavily smoke-blackened from the original open hearth fire. The dairy
block roof carried on C18 A-frame trusses.

Listing NGR: ST1990008586

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26390435

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Cork: City and County (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Ireland)
• 
  Essex: Buildings of England Series (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Northamptonshire: Buildings of England Series (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Listed Buildings, Conservation Areas and Monuments
• 
  Suffolk: West: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Norfolk 1: Norwich and North-East: Norwich and North-east v. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)