Richard Hayman - Timber-Framed Buildings

Little Moreton Hall (Cheshire), with its distinctive long gallery on the upper storey, was built in stages between the sixteenth and early-seventeenth centuries, and is a fine example of timber framing for a country house.

A PROUD MAIDEN OF lime and timber, a work of dazzling white lime that shone bright even at night; this was how Ieuan ap Hywel Swrdwal of Newtown described a new house at Bryndraenog (Powys) in a poem written for its owner, Llywelyn Fychan ab Ieuan. No one who came to his houses / would not swear that it was an angels work. The house was a timber-framed house. It was constructed in about 1436 for a rhyngill , or reeve, in the lordship of Maelienydd in mid Wales, and it remains one of the finest surviving medieval houses of Wales. Its praise poem, from an established genre in medieval Wales, is a reminder of how much pride was invested in domestic architecture and is testimony to the importance of timber-framed buildings in our history.

Timber-framed buildings are, in popular imagination, quintessentially English. In Stratford-upon-Avon the houses and school associated with Shakespeares wider family were all timber-framed. Harry Potter was born in a timber-framed building, in the fictional Godrics Hollow, which onscreen bore a striking resemblance to De Vere House in Lavenham (Suffolk). Similar buildings are among the most characteristic sights of England, and in Wales too, and are especially associated with picturesque rural scenery and historic towns. Sometimes described as half-timber or black and white, timber framing has a long history, and examples from the medieval period to the twentieth century survive today.

Broad Street in Ludlow has timber-framed buildings from the medieval period to the seventeenth century, which make an important contribution to the historic character of the town.

All kinds of buildings were erected with timber frames, with this style most closely associated with houses, and now an important aspect of our heritage of domestic architecture across different geological regions. Timber framing was also used for farm buildings and occasionally for churches and secular buildings such as guildhalls and market halls. It is a building type found across large areas of England and Wales, less commonly in Scotland, regardless of the presence of local oak woodland. The Kent and Sussex Weald provided ample timber resources for local buildings, but counties such as Suffolk and Cambridgeshire, which are far less wooded, nevertheless have a comparable heritage of timber-framed buildings. In Wales the timber-framed tradition was strong, even though good-quality building stone was easily available. In the sixteenth century timber-framed houses were characteristic of the towns of Wales and Scotland, just as much as they were in England, but they have slowly been superseded by stone and b rick buildings.

There are various misconceptions about timber framing beyond the popular myth that old ships timbers were used, including the notion that this style was only for vernacular buildings and that timber was always shunned when stone was available and affordable. In fact, all classes of building could be timber-framed. Magnificent country houses like Little Moreton Hall (Cheshire) and Pitchford Hall (Shropshire) contradict the idea that timber was for the yeoman but not the lord of the manor. In addition, there is the view that timber is a temporary material, comparing unfavourably with the permanence of stone. However, the large number of timber-framed buildings surviving from the sixteenth century does not support this. The durability of timber can be seen in Shrewsbury where some of the towns oldest buildings are the timber-framed commercial and residential buildings in its riverside localities, which have withstood flooding over sev eral centuries.

Timber-framing was used for all classes of building, including occasionally for churches. Melverley Church (Shropshire) was built in the late-sixteenth century.

The Frankwell district of Shrewsbury was at the commercial heart of the town, and retains many of its original timber-framed buildings.

The surviving heritage of timber-framed buildings does not reflect the wide range of the timber-framed tradition. For example, smaller cottages survive much less commonly than larger houses (which is the case, regardless of the building material), and many of our towns and cities have lost nearly all of their timber-framed buildings, London being the classic example. Mill Street in Warwick, close to the castle and to the medieval bridge that once spanned the Avon, survived the catastrophic fire that destroyed much of the town in 1694, and offers a glimpse of what many of our towns might have looked like if fire brigades had been established earl