Listed Building: LOWER CARDEN HALL (1229918)

SJ 45 SE CARDEN C.P. TILSTON LANE (East Side) 8/46 Lower Carden Hall 22/10/1952 I Hall (formerly home of the Leche family). North wing C15 or earlier enlarged and re-fronted early C17; south cross-wing mid C16; alterations and additions to rear by Carden Estate late C19. 2 storeys. Oak frame with plaster panels on sandstone plinth; north end gable of stone and brick; massive projecting chimneys of stone and brick on north gable and on south wall of cross-wing; rear wing of brick; grey slate roofs of steep pitch, probably formerly thatched. Front gable of cross-wing has exceptionally heavy timbers, rectangular panels to lower storey and chevrons to upper storey and gable. The north wing (with 2 gabled dormers to front) has lighter small-framing; an early C17 re-fronting of a medieval hall, it is not fully tied to the earlier internal structure. Iron casements in oak subframes, with restored leaded glazing, are probably C19. Features characteristic of late C19 Carden Estate work include cross-boarded oak door in oak case, bargeboards with 5-spiked finials and the shaped brick upper parts of chimneys. Interior: In the north wing 3 late-medieval crown-post trusses (of a form and quality not yet found elsewhere in Cheshire) are of major interest; and the early Elizabethan oak-framed structure of the cross-wing is little altered. The entrance hall (centre) has ingle-nook left (stonework remodelled C19) with great oak bressumer and small fire-window, and C19 oak stair of 2 flights, probably with early C18 turned balusters, right. The former great hall (left) has 2 C17 heavy stop-chamfered oak beams, one on 2 massive chamfered oak posts (which are in line with the former outer walls of the medieval hall, beneath posts of roof-truss in bedroom above), and ingle-nook (stonework altered C19) with great oaken bressumer. The drawing room (right, in cross-wing) has painted softwood small-panelling and an ornate corner cupboard, both early C18, and an early Victorian iron grate under mantel of painted plaster with swags and urns. The trusses in the bedrooms shown that the medieval hall was widened (and the first floor probably inserted) when the north wing was re-fronted (early C17). The left bedroom has a heavy, shaped arch-braced camber-beam (of the width of the former hall) between 2 posts (with central knot on soffite) carrying a moulded octagonal crown-post. The left-middle bedroom has a truss of unmoulded square timbers with an arch-braced camber-beam between 2 posts carrying a braced square crown-post. The braces to camber-beam and crown-post form a rough ogee. The right-middle bedroom truss, nobly massive, has a shaped camber-beam with central knot, lengthened by C17 spliced arch-braces (and showing the positions of the former medieval wall-plates), carrying a moulded octagonal crown-post. The secondary rafters in the north wing are replaced. The right bedroom (in the cross-wing) has 2 queen-strut oak trusses and is stated to have original secondary roof timbers (not visible). Listing NGR: SJ4602252230