Building record 1009500000 - PARADISE COTTAGE, 11 CHURCH END

Grade II. Small house. C15, altered. Whitewashed render over timber frame with 3 cruck trusses, 2 incomplete. C20 pantile roof with raised eaves. External chimney to left gable, small brick chimney to right. 1½ storeys, 2 bays. Wooden casements, 3-light to ground floor left, 2-light to right, first floor has C20 casements in gabled semi-dormers, 2 in right-hand bay. Entry in C20 extension to rear. Interior has open fireplace with timber-framed smoke hood (B1).
3 cruck trusses with single curve blades truncated above the collar, passing the collar but with no upper structure. Source: R.W. Evans, Buckinghamshire CC (B2).
Building survey and dendro-dating carried out in October 1990 suggest the building was constructed as a two-bay hall house, probably in the sixteenth century. Three cruck trusses remain, all with truncated apexes (types 'V' and 'W'). Built of small scantling timbers, and probably originally of only two bays, the house represents the lowest level of surviving peasant housing, and is of considerable interest. The eastern bay (bay 1) was certainly open to the rafters originally, but it is possible that the
western bay (bay 2) was floored over with a loft above. Some slight smoke blackening is evident on both sides of the central truss, suggesting that the loft and the hall were not completely separated. A largely intact timber-framed fireplace and smoke hood in bay 1 is either original or an early insertion before the hall was floored. Bay I was floored over during the seventeenth or eighteenth century, leaving the smoke-hood in place. Part of the floor over bay 2 was probably also replaced then, and a winder staircase was constructed in the NW corner of this bay. During the late Victorian or Edwardian period the roof over both bays was raised some 3-4 feet and an extension added to the north of bay 2. None of the timbers sampled could be dated, due to the shortness of the ring width series. See report for detail (B3).