5a, 7, 9 and 11 High Street with attached outbuildings, Long Buckby, West Northamptonshire

Summary

A row of C17 and C18 stone and brick buildings with later alterations, in use as dwellings and commercial premises.

Description

A row of houses and commercial premises of late-C17/C18 and C19 date with attached outbuildings and C20 alterations.

MATERIALS: constructed of coursed squared ironstone and painted brick. The roofs are covered in thatched reed and slate with brick ridge and end stacks. The windows are timber sashes and casements.

PLAN: the left range (5a and 7) is of two storeys with a central carriageway. The right range is of two principal phases and of two storeys with attics to the central (9/ Vandyplank) and right (11) bays. 9 has a two-storey rear wing and a cellar. 11 has a two storey C19 front addition in brick and single storey outbuildings and attached garden wall to the rear.

EXTERIOR: the road front has a central four-bay range that is set back behind a front garden with a low brick wall. To the right is a C19 door to ‘Vandyplank’ and there is a C19 canted bay window to the left of the door. The 12-pane sash windows have moulded stone sills, surrounds and lintels with keyblocks. There is a datestone inscribed M/IE 1752 between upper left windows. The steep part-thatched roof has a ridge stack and stone coped verges and extends by a further two bays to the right (11) behind a C19 painted brick front that extends forward to the pavement edge. There is a late C20 timber shopfront to the ground floor with C19 door with keystone and hood mould to the left. The sashes above are in modified openings and there is an inserted attic casement to the gable above and decorative bargeboards. The stone gable elevation at the east end has a casement under a timber lintel to each floor.

To the left of the four-bay front the coursed stone gable end of the attached building (7) faces east and has a boarded opening to the steep gable. The road front has a four-panel door with reeded pilaster surround. On ground floor to the right of the door is a C19 sash window and to the left is a C20 casement window with timber lintel. There are C19 casement windows with timber lintels above that are set within the eaves under the shared roof thatch roof with 5a, across a carriageway. The roof has coped stone gables with kneelers. 5a has a single-bay road front with an opening to upper left. The carriageway elevations to both buildings have a door and opposing niches that may relate to former gates. Parts of the walls are covered in an historic render. To the rear of 7 is a red brick two-storey C19 addition with casements and a door under timber lintels, and a dentil eaves cornice facing the rear garden. The brick addition is built against the west end gable of the mid-C18 house, below the kneeler to the coped roof verge. The mid-C18 bay is built against the slightly taller end gable of the primary late C17/early C18 house, also with a kneelered coped verge.

The rear elevation of 9/ Vandyplank has a brick lean-to to the right and an ironstone two-storey rear service wing to the centre with a tall brick end stack above a stone outshut built against the end elevation. The outshut has a plank end door and casement to the right. To the left is a single-bay red brick bathroom addition. Further left, the rear of 11 High Street has casements to each floor under timber lintels and a door to the right. The is some disturbance to the stonework indicating some level of reordering of the openings at ground floor level. Along the east boundary are single-storey stone and brick outbuildings at least partly constructed of reused materials, but largely hidden by foliage.

INTERIOR: 5a is arrange as a single room to each floor with a late C20 staircase. 7 has a modern dental surgery reception to the front room with a late C20 winder stair. The rear room has a C18/C19 chimneypiece with later alterations and fitted cupboards to each side. The building appears to retain a C19 planform and joinery of that date to the principal rooms including rebated shutters, doors and fitted cupboards, some with metal fitments.

9 High Street (Vandyplank): the entrance hall has a mid-C19 staircase with turned balustrade and there is other C19 joinery including doors and door architraves, and pine floorboards. The ceiling beams are boxed in. The cellar has exposed beams indicative of a late C17 date. Many of the fittings to the first floor are of later C20 date and the beams are boxed in. To the attic floor has some reused historic panelling and some of the exposed oak roof trusses are crudely worked. The roof arrangement broadly conforms to a C17 or early C18 date and it survives with most primary and some secondary elements in situ.

11 High Street has a C20 boarded internal lobby that opens into an open plan late C20 shop with kitchens to the rear with no historic fittings. The upper floors have also been reordered and there is a late C20 staircase and partial replacement of the roof. A mid-C19 staircase similar to that in Vandyplank has been moved and installed at the east end of the first/ attic floor.

SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: a coursed stone garden wall of multiple phases extends back in the plot of 11, attached to the stone and brick outbuildings. A red brick wall is attached to the rear lean-to of 7. To the front of 9 is a low red brick wall.

History

5a to 11 High Street is an evolved row of historic buildings that appears to have origins in the early C18 or earlier as part of a farmstead. 9 and 11 High Street were probably a farmhouse built in two phases with the west end bay, now shared by 7 and 9 High Street, added in 1752 (datestone). This mid-C18 end adjoins a formerly separate building that was probably originally in agricultural use and has been partially incorporated within 7 High Street. The other part of the building, across a carriageway, is 5a High Street and the building is of C17 or C18 date and may have been the principal entrance to a former farmyard to the rear.

9 High Street, known latterly as ‘Vandyplank’ and 'Vanderplank House’, may be associated with a Vanderplank family that appears prominently in early C19 records of Long Buckby. Samuel Vanderplank was a prominent local Gentleman Farmer. Another possible derivation of the building name is the residency of John Vanderplank, a 55-year-old clothworker, who was on the 1841 census and who may have lived in the house. The census of that year shows his neighbours as agricultural labourers and graziers.

The adaptation of the buildings into separate dwellings had taken place by the late C19 as shown on the Ordnance Survey Map of 1885, by which time the east end of the building (11 High Street) had been built out towards the road edge, presumably as a shopfront. To the rear, there are attached outbuildings and a clearly delineated boundary with the plot to the east. The map shows a structure to the rear of 5a High Street attached to a set of buildings around a yard that may well be a farm or smallholding.

The buildings have been altered in the C19 and C20 as their uses have changed, notably to 5a and 7 which have been converted to dwellings and then commercial premises, and the ground floor of 11 High Street. An extensive rebuilding of 11 High Street took place in the late C20 around the time that the buildings were first listed. The plot behind 5a was redeveloped as a supermarket in the late C20 by which time 5a was in use as a shop. 7 (and part of 9) was adapted to a dental surgery in the late C20.

Reasons for Listing

5a, 7, 9 and 11 High Street, a row of C17/18 buildings with later alterations and additions, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* as a well-constructed and legible example of an historic village row of buildings of C17 and C18 date; built in the local vernacular tradition with ironstone elevations under steep roofs covered in thatch and slate;
* it is well-preserved as an evolved set of historic buildings with probable origins as part of a farmstead, and retains a high proportion of historic fabric with some fittings;
* the C19 shopfront to 7 High Street is a good representative example of the type.

Historic interest:

* as an illustration of the evolution of Long Buckby from its rural farming origins to a commercial C19 character with timber shopfronts at the road edge while retaining a residential character to the building between.

External Links

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