Early 18th century brick-built stable and early 19th century timber framed barn, Upshire Hall (EHER 80916)

An early 18th century brick-built stable and a five-bay, timber framed, early 19th century barn with 19th and 20th century alterations. The stable is divided into four stalls and has an original brick paved floor. A tack room was added in the late 19th century. The barn has first floor store rooms to the North and South, and a hay loft over the midstrey. To the South of the midstrey porch is a lean-to stable and to the North is a flat-roofed addition that forms part of an integrated livery with tack room and stalls within the two Northern bays of the barn. A transparent corrugated plastic-roofed carport has been added in front of a roller shutter door.

May 2015. Heritage assessment. An early 18th century brick-built stable and a five-bay, timber framed, early 19th century barn with 19th and 20th century alterations. Both buildings now abut. The stable is divided into four stalls and has an original brick paved floor. A tack room was added in the late 19th century. The barn has external late 20th century weatherboarding and is covered in plain tile. It retains its internal floors which is quite unusual. There are first floor store rooms to North and South and a hay loft over the midstrey. To the South of the midstrey porch is a lean-to stable and to the North is a flat-roofed addition that forms part of an integrated livery with tack room and stalls within the two Northern bays of the barn. A transparent corrugated plastic-roofed carport has been added in front of a roller shutter door. The earliest part of the buildings is the Eastern perimeter wall of the stables and the North wall common with the South of the Barn. These connected structures are the remains of an earlier structure possibly shown on the historic mapping in 1777 and more definitely on the 1805 OS map. The bricks and construction type of the stable match those of Upshire Hall (EHER 34109), built in the early 18th century. The timber frame of the barn, seen in the porch and upper registers, is of early 19th century construction and is symbolic of the Napoleonic Era increase in farming production. Between 1842 and 1870 the ground plans of the barn and stable were altered. The barn lost an outshot on the Eastern side while the Stable gained one on the Western side. Internally, the barn was divided up with a studwork partition wall in the line of the porch North wall and brick walls were used to replace the lower registers to create a secure grain store. The granary floor was inserted using machine cut softwood marked with Scandinavian bracking marks. In the Southern bay, a new floor was inserted to house accommodation for a stablehand, consisting of two rooms (now the tack room and apple store). A poorly constructed timber staircase was created to access these rooms. In the same period, the stable was rebuilt and a suite of horse stalls put in along with a tack room with a corner chimney to provide warmth for the stablehand and to heat the horse mash in winter. The barn was later retiled in the mid 20th century using narrow machine made battens that the peg tiles are nailed to, and the stable was reroofed in the late 20th century. A garage was added to the South side of the porch with typical mid 20th century garage doors with reversible hinges. In the late 20th century the site became a livery. <1>