Description

SX 47 SE
6/167

WHITCHURCH
Lower Tor Farmhouse

II

Farmhouse. C16 origin, altered c.1800 with C18 stable attached to front left and lean-to to right. C20 alterations. Granite rubble and granite dressings, painted front. Slate and asbestos slate roof, tiled to rear slope, with ridge stack heating hall and gable end stack to lower end to right.

Originally cross passage and three-room plan, hall to left heated by axial stack backing on to passage, with narrow unheated inner room. Lower end room to right heated by gable end stack. The upper end may have original extended further to left, and the present hall and inner room would have been one room, with stair to rear left of hall and inner room at left end. Late C18/c1800,a stable was added to the left end, forming an L-plan; this incorporated the original inner room. Since the stair would have been removed at this time, a stair was inserted to the rear of the passage, divided to right and left, giving separate access to the first floor rooms. C20 alterations include additions to the front and windows. Two storeys and four windows, at first floor all two-light and single light C20 casements, ground floor has single light to inner room to left, hall has two windows, to left a granite mullion and transom window, chamfered, with two-centred arched heads to upper lights and recessed spandrels, dripstone; C20 window to right.

Passage door enclosed by C20 single storey lean-to, glazed, with C20 window to lower end to right. Single storey lean-to to end right with door and two-light window under one lintel. Single storey stable attached to front left has two doors and two ventilation slits, corrugated iron roof. Right gable end formerly had two flues, at first floor level between the two flues, a small wooden-framed cusped light, blocked. Gable end to left is rendered above the stable roof. To rear, straight joint between the lower end and the lean-to, and a six-pane stair light.

Rear of hall has four-pane light at ground floor and nine-pane light under eaves. To end right, the wall is curved out, with a small single light at low level with slate weatherings above, originally a stair projection. Rear of the stable has window opening at ground floor with cambered timber lintel. Stacks rebuilt C19.

Interior: passage leads to rear door to stair; at first floor over the lower end there is a corbel on the rear wall, C19 principal rafters visible. Solid wall between passage and lower end room to right, step up to left to hall. Hall has one boxed beam, C20 fireplace. Partition wall inserted to form narrow inner room.

Listing NGR: SX4729271601

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26444991

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

• 
  Period Property Manual (New Ed)
• 
  Cork: City and County (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Ireland)
• 
  Yorkshire West Riding: Leeds, Bradford and the North (Pevsner Architectural Guides / Buildings of England)
• 
  Maintaining and Repairing Old Houses: A Guide to Conservation, Sustainability and Economy
• 
  Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, and Peterborough (Pevsner Architectural Guides): Written by Charles O'Brien, 2014 Edition, Publisher: Yale University Press [Hardcover]
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey