Building record SRL 023 - Cricketers/Mollands Hall

The Cricketers, although operating as a Public House from the 19th century until its closure in the 1940s, was built as a substantial Yeoman farmhouse in 1630. Until an extensive restoration of the mid-1990s, which saw the replacement of many original timbers, this date was carved into the external tie-beam of its left-hand gable (and now appears in the plaster of the new porch). The initials of its first owner, ‘TT’, lay alongside, and the house was almost certainly the work of the Turner family, whose name appears in contemporary parish records. Firmly dated farmhouses houses of the 17th century are rare, and this, combined with evidence of extensive alterations shortly after its construction, which included the renewal of the chimney and the addition of a stair tower, lends The Cricketers a considerable degree of historic significance. The building documents the rapidly changing expectations of domestic comfort in mid-17th century England, and also preserves one of the finest period staircases in the Suffolk.

The original internal layout of the house reflected the standard pattern of medieval and Tudor houses. The modern house is arranged in much the same way although it would appear that major changeshad occurred prior to the restoration of c.1996 which sought to retun the building to its 17th century state and removed evidence of its subsequent evolution (S1).