STAPLEHURST HIGH STREET TQ 74 SE (West side) 3/135 Bell Cottage, steps and 23.5.67 handrail GV II Part of public house, now house. Late C16 or early C17. Timber framed. Ground floor red and grey brick in Flemish bond, first floor clad with banded plain and fishscale tiles. Both floors of long left side weatherboarded. Plain tile roof. Built at right- angles to road and formerly an integral part of the Bell public house to right. 2 storeys and cellar. First floor of front gable end jettied on moulded bressumer, which continues slightly to right of right end of gable. Solid-spandrel bracket to left of door. Jettied coved eaves to rear gable end. Stack not easily visible from road. One 3-light first-floor casement. Canted oriel window to ground floor, with cellar hatch under. Half-glazed door to right end, up 7 stone steps rising against wall of house, with plain iron handrail and stick balusters. Interior: only partly inspected. Ovolo-moulded cross and axial beams to ground floor of front room, with evidence for integral corridor down right side (within building). Blocked chamfered rectangular doorway towards front of right side. Inglenook fireplace. Public House to right (The Bell) rebuilt in early C20 after a fire. (see drawing in K. Gravett, Timber and Brick Building in Kent, 1971.) Listing NGR: TQ7856742995