C16-C17 timber-framed and plastered house with a cross wing at the north end. The south wing has been destroyed and there are some modern alterations and additions. One storey and attics. Casement windows (C20). Roof tiled with 2 gabled dormers to the main block and, at the south end, an original cruciform chimney stack with the shafts set diagonally on a square base.
From An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in Essex, Volume 1, North West (1916)
Lakehouse Farm, house, now two tenements, about 1¾ m. E. of the church, was built late in the 16th or early in the 17th century, but the S. end has been destroyed. There are modern additions on the E. side. The original S. chimney-stack has grouped diagonal shafts on a square base with a moulded capping. Inside the building, on the ground floor, in the N. room is a wall-post with a slightly ornamented top.
The name of Lakehouse Farm almost certainly comes from the de Lacre family. In 1236, Walter de Lacre leased 15 acres of wood to his uncle for ‘assarting’ (this is the practice of reclaiming woodland for agricuture by grubbing up trees and bushes). The annual rent was a pair of falconer’s gloves or sixpence! It seems highly likely that the wood in question is the same as the 15 acre Lakers Wood which still survives a short distance to the east of Lakehouse Farm and that it was never in fact assarted: although the same cannot be said for the adjacent Latchley Wood, which has disappeared altogether.