Comments on: The Tithe Barn

By: CherryPie

CherryPie — Mon, 23 Feb 2015 21:03:46 +0000

The building is very photogenic

By: CherryPie

CherryPie — Mon, 23 Feb 2015 21:02:32 +0000

I am so familiar with the squared timber constructions that it hadn’t even registered with me that I have only seen them locally. I have had a look in my property guidebooks but most of them don’t even mention the construction.

Little Morton Hall is a rather showy version of squared timber construction. This is what the guidebook has to say about it:

One of the principle delights of Little Morton Hall is that its timbers are arranged in a rich variety of patterns largely within square panels. Both square panelling and ornamental panelling of decorative timber framing, which were especially popular in Elizabethan times, are mainly found in the West Midlands and the Welsh Borders. But it was the gentry of Lancashire and Cheshire who used these techniques to their most glorious and dazzling effect. Another local technique is that of coving – a concave plaster cove beneath each overhand or jetty.

By: London Caller

London Caller — Mon, 23 Feb 2015 08:56:11 +0000

Wow, this one looks so much better than the one in Bradford on Avon!

By: wiggia

wiggia — Mon, 23 Feb 2015 08:19:23 +0000

The Hodnet barn shows the squared timber construction that is unique to that part of the world, many buildings survive in Cheshire , Shropshire and north Wales with the same characteristics.
I have never been able to find out why that area preferred that method over the more general vertical and diagonal style used elsewhere and how it was arrived at ?

By: CherryPie

CherryPie — Sun, 22 Feb 2015 15:24:20 +0000

The focus of Hodnet is the gardens which are one of my favourite. This building along with others is part of the estate near to the gardens. You have to gain entry to the gardens to be able to view them.

By: CherryPie

CherryPie — Sun, 22 Feb 2015 15:21:43 +0000

Thanks Wiggia, very interesting I would like to find out a bit more about the history of the one at Hodnet. If I get chance I will do a bit of digging around.

By: CherryPie

CherryPie — Sun, 22 Feb 2015 15:14:19 +0000

Thanks for that Amfortas Although in not quite the same way churches still look after the needs of the poor today.

By: J_on_tour

J_on_tour — Sun, 22 Feb 2015 13:59:09 +0000

That’s a wonderful building to have preserved when usually we expect to see re-creations in a kind of theme park to set the scene in similar types of locations. Excuse my ignorance but I haven’t heard of Hodnet Hall before, I rely on you for education in gaps of my historic housing knowledge

By: wiggia

wiggia — Sun, 22 Feb 2015 09:00:43 +0000

Having until recently lived in a converted barn and having come from an area that has more of them than anywhere else in the country, I naturally have an interest in them.
In Essex nearly all are of wood construction and some are enormous but this one at Cressing near Braintree is one of the oldest circa 1260
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cressing_Temple
and is the wheat barn, now a national monument.
Going north in East Anglia the construction starts to change and in Norfolk there are many of brick and flint and brick construction as well as a combination with wood.
This one at Hales Hall near Dereham in Norfolk is the largest brick barn in England and has taken the owning family 30 years to restore.
http://loddon.org.uk/loddonwp/haleshall/
Whilst many were lost many have been saved or converted, they are part of our heritage.

By: amfortas

amfortas — Sun, 22 Feb 2015 07:48:37 +0000

Not that such a thought did not occur in some liklihood. One has to recall the capture and ransom of Richard the Lionheart. His ransom was an entire year’s GDP of Britain.