Browne House

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• General Visitor Information

Constructed between 1694 and 1701 for a farming family, Browne House contains rare surviving architectural features from the late seventeenth century. In a near ruinous state when it was acquired by Historic New England founder William Sumner Appleton in 1919, the house was painstakingly restored in what is acknowledged to be the first fully documented restoration in America.

Browne House is a modest “one-over-one” dwelling with eighteenth- and nineteenth-century additions. Prominent features include a steeply pitched roof, diamond-patterned casement windows, and early door and window placements and styles. During the restoration, an impressive amount of seventeenth-century finish detail was uncovered.

Visitors learn about the way a late seventeenth-century family lived in what was termed a “mansion house” at the time. There is one large room on the first floor, which incorporated living, cooking, and sleeping space. The upper chamber contains an extremely rare three-part casement window frame.