Farmstead record HRG 027 - Farmstead: Little Knowles Green Farm

Little Knowles Green Farm is a farmstead visible on the 1st Ed Os map. The farmstead is laid out in a loose courtyard plan. The farmstead sits alongside a private track in an isolated location. There has been a significant loss of working buildings with the remaining converted for residential use. (S1-4)

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.

Little Knowles Green farmhouse is listed as 18th century but contains a substantial fragment of a late-15th century timber-framed building. The early fragment lies at the eastern end of the structure, and originally formed the parlour of a medieval open hall that rose to only eight feet at its eaves. The hall was open to its roof in the manner of a barn, and probably heated by a bonfire-like open heath burning on its floor. The ‘high-end’ of this hall still survives, with decorative bracing that was designed to emphasise the importance of its first owner, who sat on its dais at formal meals, but the rest of the house was rebuilt in the 17th or early-18th century when its walls were raised by 5 feet to accommodate an upper storey. The present parlour at the western end of the building consists largely of pine and appears to represent an extension of the 19th century, while the entire roof was replaced in the 20th century. As a result of these various alterations the farmhouse illustrates the changing nature of domestic life over a period of five centuries and is of considerable historic interest (S5).