Treworval Farmhouse Including Front Garden Area Wall

Treworval Farmhouse

A farmhouse dating from the early to mid-18th century, with 20th-century alterations. The building is constructed of granite rubble with granite dressings, the first floor front being slate hung. The roof is grouted scantle slate with cambered granite coping to the gable ends and shaped kneelers. Gable end stacks have red brick shafts with granite moulded caps. The axial stack to the left of centre has been truncated below the ridge.

The plan is of double depth, with three principal rooms at the front arranged in the traditional 3-room and cross passage layout: the lower end to the left and inner room to the right are both heated from gable end stacks, whilst the hall is heated from an axial stack at its lower end backing onto the entrance passage. Along the back are shallow unheated rooms and a stairwell behind the cross passage and hall stack, all forming an integral part of the plan under a single span roof. A small single storey porch stands behind the rear left-hand room, with a later privy also at the back. In the 20th century, partitions were removed between the hall, inner room, and the room behind to create one large room at this end.

The exterior presents two storeys. The nearly symmetrical south front has a slate hung first floor with four windows, and a dressed granite band below continuing through the ground floor window lintels, which are grooved to imitate voussoirs. All front windows have granite cills. The front windows are 20th-century 3-light casements, except for the ground floor right window, which has had its cill lowered for a 20th-century garden door. The original doorway to the left of centre has a wide 6-panel door and a 20th-century glazed porch.

The rear elevation contains all original 18th-century windows: two first floor 3-light casements with glazing bars and a large 3-light stair window with 14 panes per light on the first floor; on the ground floor to the right, another smaller 3-light window with glazing bars. An 18th-century single storey stone rubble porch with granite monolithic quoins and a scantle slate hipped roof stands here. To the left, ground floor windows have been blocked and a small privy added.

Much early to mid-18th-century joinery survives in the interior. The entrance passage has plank screens with moulded muntins and wide fielded 2-panel doors. The passage leads to a stairwell at the back containing a fine open-well staircase with moulded string, turned balusters, moulded handrails ramped up to square newels. The first floor features a complete set of 18th-century fielded 2-panel doors and chimney-pieces, one with a fluted frieze, though some dado rails have been removed.

On the ground floor, the lower left-hand room has exposed ceiling joists with ovolo edge-moulding; the corners at the left end are rounded and the fireplace in the end wall is 20th-century with a granite lintel. An 18th-century fielded 2-panel door leads to the back room, now partitioned to form a corridor to the back doorway. Between the front and back rooms at the left end is a horizontally boarded partition. The partition between the centre right-hand and back room has been removed, forming one large room with a 20th-century fireplace at the right-hand end.

The listing includes the 18th-century front garden area wall, a low granite rubble wall with cambered dressed granite coping ramped up at the right-hand end to the taller side wall. Granite gate-piers to the left of centre are later additions.

This early to mid-18th-century house displays an interesting transitional plan, rather conservative for a substantial farmhouse. It remains largely intact except for the removal of partitions at the right-hand end, though these could readily be reinstated. Treworval Farmhouse was situated within the small manor of Treworval.