Interior
East Range
Ground floor – the kitchen (believed to be the original Great Hall) at the north end of the range is a large high-ceilinged room with a flagged floor lit from the east by a pair of windows with deeply splayed cills. There is another two-light window with hollow chamfered mouldings, now internal, in the west wall next to a stone doorway with a four-centred head. A 20th century north door communicates with a lobby in the main range; plans shows a short flight of steps in this position as there is a difference in floor levels. At the south end of the room there is a large fireplace; the ashlar lintel has a keystone carved with a shield. To the east there is a late medieval doorway with a four-centred head; one jamb leans outwards with the external wall. Above this, looking into the room there is a small wooden oriel with leaded lights. There is a second door of the same pattern in the passage beyond adjoining the stack; the east door visible externally is blanked off. The rooms to the south of the kitchen had modern subdivisions but were formerly the scullery, with a fireplace in the reverse of the stack; the larder, leading to a game larder in the east wing of the south range; and the press room with external access only.
The passage west of the kitchen has been divided by a curved early 20th century partition wall. At the north end adjoining a door to the main range, also approached by the steps, is the outline of a blocked four-centred doorway at a lower level, suggesting that this wall formed part of the older house. Mounted over the extant door and leading to the Justice Room, in a glass case is a plaster overmantel of c. 1600. It is moulded in high relief and comprises a strapwork cartouche containing a scene of Daniel in the lions´ den flanked by panels of fruit and foliage and turned through 90º, two large female figures of Justice, holding scales, and Mercy, holding a lamb. At the south end of this passage forming part of a studwork partition is an oak door, reused in this position, with a four-centred head, moulded jambs and carved spandrels on both faces. Central to the south side of the small incised initials NH (for Nicholas Halswell).
First floor – rooms at this level were linked by a long corridor on the west side of the range which has several changes of level reflecting different building periods. In general detailing in this passage and adjoining rooms is 18th century. The room at the south end of the range (Grey room) has a high carved ceiling with bands of running scroll plaster ornament and tall mahogany doors with reeded architraves of early 19th century type. The adjoining room (Green room) has been subdivided; it has a lower ceiling with a box cornice. The room to the north (Blue room) is fully panelled with cornice and dado rail; incorporated into this scheme in the north-east corner there is a door leading to a closet at a lower level. It masks a small oak doorway with a four-centred head visible on the reverse. The closet has a low ceiling and two small windows with heavy (renewed) oak lintels. One has been blocked but formed a small internal oriel overlooking the kitchen below.
There is a marked change in level between these rooms and the north end of the range, reflecting the external change in build. Here the corridor is markedly wider and connects directly with the north range at mezzanine landing level off the principal staircase. Also opening onto this landing is the Boudoir; this has a bold cornice of acanthus leaves like that in the Alcove room, but the lower walls are panelled and plastered onto battens in mid-18th century style. This has been removed from the south wall to expose a Perpendicular-style fireplace surround with a four-centred head, ogee mouldings and semi-octagonal stops built into a rubble wall with an integral relieving arch. A photograph of 1908 (Country Life, 705) shows an elaborate Rococo surround in this position: now lost. The wall to the west retains patches of plaster cut by fixing blocks for earlier wooden panelling. There are closets on either side of the stack; the western has old oak floorboards, a single-light window of Perpendicular type, which is now internal, and an oak-framed doorway with a four-centred head.
Top floor and roof – on the top floor was a series of attics formerly used as servants bedrooms, accessed from the stair in the south-east corner of the courtyard. The top of the flight is within the range and a short length of turned wooden balustrading of 17th century type is incorporated into a partition at the head of the stairs. There was no access to the room at the south end of the range (shown as a void on the Vickery plans). This part of the roof is built of substantial clean oak timbers in good condition without mouldings. The two trusses have pairs of collars; the upper cambered, the lower straight and visible in the rooms below where they are plastered over. There are three tiers of large rectangular-section purlins, halved and pegged at the trusses, and a clasped ridge piece. The gables are later than this roof and set at a higher level they are also oak with two tiers of square-section purlins. The roof over the north end of the range has three trusses of similar form.
