Achards

Achards is a large detached house located on Bath Road in Rodborough. It dates from the early 18th century but is built on an older site and has undergone extensive restorations in the 19th and 20th centuries. The house is constructed of random rubble limestone with roughcast render and features rendered brick-rebuilt chimneys and a stone slate roof. It is two stories high with an attic and cellar, and there is a 20th-century rear addition that links to a barn to the north.

The front of the house has a seven-window arrangement grouped as 2:3:2, with all stone cross windows featuring hoodmoulds, except for two ground floor sashes on the right that have plain keyed architraves. There are two cellar 2-light chamfered mullioned casements located below the sashes in a stone plinth. To the left of center, there is a 20th-century hipped roofed porch, and at each end of the hipped and sprocketed roof, there are gabled 19th-century roof dormers with a modillion eaves cornice. The house has irregularly coursed exposed quoins and two ridge-mounted chimneys.

On the south end, there is a lean-to conservatory with two cross windows above. The rear of the house features cross windows on the left side, similar to those on the front. The 20th-century altered rear wing is not of special interest, and there is a lower-roofed addition at the north end with various 20th-century alterations, including a blocked cross window above.

Inside, there is an open well staircase with splat balusters that appears to have been altered or repositioned in the 19th century. The house contains various classical fireplaces that are said to have come from Bristol. A view from 1797 shows Achards with a large gabled section at the south end, which may indicate that it was originally part of a 16th or 17th-century house to which the early 18th-century building was attached.