Listed Building: WETHERDEN HALL (487312)

WETHERDEN TM 06 SW 1227/4/10004 Wetherden Hall II House, formerly manor house. late C15, remodelled and extended early C19 and with C20 alterations. Earlier range probably for Sir John Sulyard (d.1487), Chief Justice to Richard III (r.1483-5). MATERIALS: Brick rendered in part and all whitewashed with timber-frame to rear range. Hipped slate roof with brick ridge and side stacks. Double-depth central staircase plan with wing to rear right. Front range is early C19, rear range has rooms formed from two truncated and altered C15 ranges. EXTERIOR: 2 storeys. Symmetrical 3-bay front. 3-window range at first floor of C20 windows. Early C19 central porch on Doric columns leads to glazed door. C20 steel French windows to either side. Similar windows and French windows on right side; garage on left side. 2-and 3-light casements, mainly C20, to rear, with projecting stack in re-entrant angle. INTERIOR: Hall has early C19 staircase with stick balustrade, rooms above of early C19 character. The rear range is l-shaped: one-and-a-half bay left arm, three-bay right arm (kitchen and sitting room). On ground floor left arm has triangular-profiled roll-and-scotia moulded common joists and damaged moulded bridging beam. Right arm has massive crossed bridging beams (some boxed and plastered), those visible with broad chamfers, step-stopped. On first floor left arm has jowled wall posts, double-ogee moulded on one face only of closed truss. Similarly right arm has a pair of wall posts, one double-ogee moulded with a mason-mitred stop as for a moulded doorway, the other chamfered in two orders. At roof level, close studding, with wattle and daub infill in places; bridging beams and wall plates, one section with edge-halved and bridled scarf. Important reused components in C19 ceiling and roof construction including studs with gouging for original exposed brick nogging, moulded muntins from a cross-passage-type screen, moulded joist/rafters, some with provision for applied boss or motif, hollow-chamfered joists, some with jetty evidence. HISTORY: This moated site was the home of the Sulyard family in the C15 and C16. Sir John and his widow financed the outstanding nave and aisle roofs of St. Mary's Church, Wetherden (qv). The position of the causeway across the moat indicates that the remaining important fragment of their house was probably part of the gatehouse range at or near the east end of a courtyard house about 50 metres long, and whose hall range was to the west of the present house. Listing NGR: TM0207964121