A two storey, 17th centry, timber-framed farmhouse with an 'L' shape plan, brick chimneys, and three-tier framing.

[Additional:] Birchy Bank (formerly Tyn-twll) is a substantially complete timber-framed house with the regional lobby-entrance plan. It belongs to the 'family' of hall and parlour cross-wing houses, which exhibit considerable variation. At Birchy Bank a large parlour cross-wing is attached to the upper end of a hall/kitchen, which has a lobby entrance against the end chimney. The cross-wing is downhill-sited and presents to the road an impressive framed gable-end on a high plinth.

Hall and parlour cross-wing are contemporary as the beams running through both ranges show. The parlour is a large room spanned by a remarkable cambered beam which must have been deliberately selected to dignify the room. A small service-room adjoins the parlour. At the upper end of the cross-wing there are two interconnecting rooms entered from the kitchen which appear to have formed a self-contained unit. The y have no obvious function but may have functioned as separate domestic accommodation. Retirement agreements involving separate accommodation for widows are not uncommon. The necessity of providing this accommodation may explain the preference for a large wing rather than a parlour at the entry.

The moderately chamfered beams with ogee stops (some formed better than others) show that the house was built in the C17th; the windbraced roof suggesting an earlier rather than later C17th construction date.

In a second phase, dated 1836 on the framing over a new doorway at the upper end of the cross-wing, the house was modernised. The gable-end and its fireplace was rebuilt in stone and brick but the lobby entrance was retained. The ladder stair in the hall was replaced by a stair adjacent to the fireplace. The parlour was reduced and the service room enlarged. The self-contained unit was adapted as a back kitchen with boiler and an outside store. The windows and some doors were replaced. The house has changed little since then, apart from a storeyed brick-built store (bricks marked 'Blockley') added in the angle between hall and wing. Much of the framing survives beneath C20th boarding and asbestos sheeting. The house last functioned as a farmhouse in the 1950s but had occasional tenants subsequently.

Field Observation 19th November 2014. R.F. Suggett & Geoff Ward/RCAHMW/November 2014.