SNN117166 - Historic Building Recording of Farm Buildings at Grange Farm, Irthlingborough Road, Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, NN8 1RG

Pre-Construct Archaeology Limited was commissioned by Grace Homes Limited to carry out historic building recording of a group of disused farm buildings and structures at Grange Farm, Irthlingborough Road, Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, NN8 1RG. None of the farm buildings are listed nor is the farmhouse nor do they lie in a Conservation Area. The buildings were assessed in 2022 by PCA Heritage as part of the wider planning application for residential development. The Heritage Statement found that Irthlingborough Grange, a large former farmhouse was constructed in the first quarter of the 19th century and the extant farm buildings were added either in the 19th or early 20th centuries. Planning Application (NW/22/00903/FUL) for the ‘Demolition of former farm buildings and erection of 60 dwellings…’ at Grange Farm, Irthlingborough Road was granted on appeal (APP/M2840/W/24/3351908) in February 2025. The historic building recording was carried out in order to fulfil a condition on the Appeal Decision. Grange Farm was originally built shortly after the enclosure of Irthlingborough in 1808-1814. Documentary evidence indicates that the farm was inhabited by 1824, when it was the residence of John Baron Howes. The farm originally formed part of the Estates of the Dean and Chapter of Peterborough. Howes was primarily a sheep farmer, supplemented by a smaller herd of cattle. He was succeeded by a series of tenant farmers during the remainder of the 19th century, most of who appear to have been sheep and cattle farmers, some with smaller herds of pigs. Horses were also bred on the farm in the 1880s and early 1890s. Feed crops were also cultivated on the farm during the period. In the early 1890s, the farm was purchased by Wellingborough Urban District Council (UDC) to enable the development of a sewage farm in its low-lying meadows. Thereafter, the farm was managed by council appointed bailiffs. The first iteration of Grange Farm had little in common with the present farm buildings, adopting a more traditional ‘parallel plan’ form more typical of smaller farm holdings of the region. It underwent a considerable remodelling in the second half of the 19th century (1861-1884) when the existing farm buildings were adapted and new farm buildings added to form two large stockyards laid out to the principles of an ‘industrial’ planned farm for cattle. This layout was slightly re-arranged during the first quarter of the 20th century (1900-24) when two new cow sheds were introduced into the southern stockyard, relocating existing pig styes outside the southern yard. Their addition demonstrates a continued focus on livestock and given the keeping of pigs, the maintenance of a dairy herd. This period also saw the construction of a new granary, possibly with a wagon/implement shed at ground floor level and a large Dutch barn for storing straw/hay for animal feed/bedding. Their addition would argue that the large barn shown on the aerial photograph (late 1960s/70s) had been previously adapted to house cattle (from its adjoining yard) and that by the first half of the 20th century the farm was in mixed use.