Out of the low, solidly built, square tower rises a slender spire. Many who see it for the first time think it a little out of proportion, as if it had slipped down. Spires of this style were very common at one time, but the passing of the years has seen them tumble or burn, so that not very many are now to be seen in the old country. But a little study will soon persuade one that its proportions are perfect, and that any other way of building it would present either a top heavy tower, or a stumpy and unattractive building. It is of wood, covered with heavy sheets of lead. The rest of the tower is roofed with copper.

The roof presented a problem. To be in character it had to be of stone, and the proper stone was difficult to obtain. The architect, Mr. Louis Jallade of New York, was travelling in England in 1926, and was in Calcot soon after a high wind threw down the oldest tithe-barn in the country. It had once belonged to the Cistercian monks of Kingswood Abbey, and into it the tenants of monastic lands brought their rents and tithes in kind.
... our roof is of great antiquity, probably over six hundred years old

Purchasing the roof stones, and satisfying the town council of the fine use to which they would be put, Mr. Jallade packed them in ammunition cases, and they came to our shores as ballast in a ship. They have been put on this roof as carefully as possible, and as nearly in the former positions as could be determined. So our roof is of great antiquity, probably over six hundred years, because the cornerstone of the barn was inscribed 1300 A. D. The sag in the roof line of ten inches, and the waves in the roof surface are built in to convey the age which is really there. The material is not slate, but stone.