MSO10543 - Couple Cross, Cutcombe (Building)

Cottage. Early C19. Roughcast over rubble, diagonal buttresses, overhanging eaves, soffit board, bitumen covered slate roof, curved out over central bay, central square roughcast stack. Plan: double pile with central curved bay. Two storeys, 3-bays, central full height curved bay, with paired arrowslit windows on each floor without hoodmoulds, others 2-light leaded metal casements, inserted square headed entrance in centre, plank door. One of a group of Chargot estate cottages. [1] English Heritage Listed Building Number: 265312. First Listed on 22/05/1969. [2] Double pile plan. Stone, Render, roughcast and pebbledash walls. Hipped roof [3] The building was visited in June 2012 as part of the rapid condition survey of Exmoor's Listed Buildings 2012-13. It received a BAR score of 6. [4] Couple Cross Cottage is the best preserved of at least six identical pairs of cottages built circa 1820 on the Chargot Estate around Luxborough on the east side of Exmoor National Park. The building, which originally contained two four-roomed cottages, has a shallow-bowed central projection containing a common entrance passage with a steep newel stair to each side. The bowed section incorporating the two stairs and entrance passage is carried into the roof, which is hipped and slated. There is a wide overhang to the eaves, and the walls of the cottage are roughcast over rubble. There is a prominent central stone stack which was shared by the two cottages, and diagonal corner buttresses to the front (south) elevation. To the east is a rubble outbuilding with a gabled roof containing a stable for each cottage. Apart from changes to the fenestration and conversion of the two cottages to a single dwelling, probably in the late 19th or early 20th Century, the building had undergone little change at the time of the RCHME survey. [5] This record was enhanced as part of the National Record of the Historic Environment to Exmoor National Park Historic Environment Record data transfer project. [6] The building was assessed as part of the 2018-19 rapid condition survey of Exmoor’s Listed Buildings, receiving a BAR score of 6. [7]