Farmstead record WSS 028 - Farmstead: Whitehouse Farm

Whitehouse Farm is a farmstead visible on the 1st Ed Os map. The farmstead is laid out in a regular full-plan with additional detached elements. The farmhouse is attached to an agricultural range forming a U-plan courtyard. The farmstead sits alongside a public road in a village location. There has been a partial loss of working buildings. (S2-5)

The farmhouse was probably originally constructed, with the barn, in the later sixteenth century. The barn was probably originally rendered, and then weather boarded in the later eighteenth century. The house and the barn were extended and altered in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The brick built loosebox or stable to the east of the barn is probably of mid to late eighteenth century date and thus a relatively rare survival. The ladder stair set into the internal wall suggests that it once had a hayloft within the eaves, an almost universal feature of eighteenth century stables in the region. Its southern tack room extension may date from the same period as the brick alterations to the barn’s southern elevation which included an extension to the cart porch. By 1884 1st ed Ordnance Survey map both the range of outbuildings linking the farmhouse to the cartshed, and the farm building had been constructed. The range of outbuildings linking the house and cartshed were probably built incrementally over a considerable period. It is possible that the waggon shed dates from before 1850 as a structure appears on the 1850 sketch plan. The farmhouse is of timber framed construction, with a painted lime based render to the exterior, the roof is covered with red clay pan tiles, although it is likely the covering was originally thatch. Significant areas of the lime render have been replaced with cement, particularly to the north and west elevations, and sections of the timber frame appear to have been replaced with brick. The farm buildings are of a similar construction; timber framed with weatherboard and brick (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.