Farmstead record ESO 021 - Farmstead: Poplar Farm

Poplar Farm is a farmstead visible on the 1st Ed OS map. The farmstead is laid out in a regular U-plan with the farmhouse detached and set away from the yard. The farmstead sits alongside a public road in an isolated location. This farmstead survives intact.

2015: A Historic Asset Assessment was prepared from a barn at Poplar Farm for a planning application for conversion. The farmhouse is a Grade II listed timber-framed and rendered building dated to the 16th/early 17th centuries. At the time of the parish tithe survey in 1840 the farm was a middle-sized tenanted arable holding of 63. 25 acres. The farm buildings to the north include a timber-framed and weatherboarded six-bay barn of the mid- to late-16th century with a fine and rare queen-post roof . This type of structure is unique to north-central Suffolk. The roof is exceptionally complete, with only a few common rafters renewed in recent years, and most of the wall framing survives intact. There is evidence of an original integral stable in the northern bay (a feature also rarely found outside East Anglia) and a 19th century threshing floor of stone flags remains in situ. The barn was entered from the west, and formed the eastern side of a large yard flanked by the farmhouse to the south. The relationship between the house and barn is of special historic interest as it illustrates the layout of local farmsteads in the Tudor period. The integral stable was removed in the 18th/early 19th centuries but the southern bays still contain a late 19th or early 20th century grain floor with evidence of grain bins on its boarded upper storey. A pair of single storied-sheds with post and rail walls and pantiled roofs was added to the barn's western elevation in the final years of the 19th century, one of which contains a well preserved stable with a brock floor and boarded manger (S1).

Recorded as part of the Farmsteads in the Suffolk Countryside Project. This is a purely desk-based study and no site visits were undertaken. These records are not intended to be a definitive assessment of these buildings. Dating reflects their presence at a point in time on historic maps and there is potential for earlier origins to buildings and farmsteads. This project highlights a potential need for a more in depth field study of farmstead to gather more specific age data.