Plas Glan-yr-Afon

Plas Glan-yr-Afon

A two-storey house with attic, built on a basic L-plan. The building is constructed of roughly coursed rubblestone with traces of render and limewash, and has a partly grouted slate roof with slate-coped verges. It dates from the 18th century with significant mid-18th-century interior remodelling.

The south elevation, which serves as the entrance front, comprises a three-bay range to the left with a doorway positioned to the right in the angle formed by a projecting two-bay range. The openings throughout the house originally contained recessed 12-paned sash windows, now replaced with late 20th-century plastic windows. Integral end stacks have been rebuilt at both gable ends; the left stack has a doorway on the ground floor and two windows on the first floor, while the projecting range has two blind windows on the first floor. A rooflight is positioned roughly to the centre of the main range.

The east elevation has a 20th-century lean-to addition to the left, with two windows to the right on the ground floor (the left wider than the right) and five windows on the first floor—two to the left and three to the right, with the middle window of the latter group being a later insertion. A boarded door opens to the north gable end. The northern projection has an integral end stack but is otherwise blank to the gable end. The west side features a brick parapet and two symmetrically spaced windows on each floor; the right-hand window abuts a large lateral stack on the back wall of the entrance range.

The interior contains many fixtures and fittings from the mid-18th-century remodelling. The staircase rises in straight flights from the panelled hall to the similarly panelled landing and thence to the attic. It features ramped square newels, elegant turned balusters (two to each tread), a closed moulded string decorated with scotia moulding to the treads, and a moulded handrail. Notably, there is no diminution in status as the staircase rises, except that at attic level the balustrade becomes solid with raised panels. The contemporary panelling in the hall, landing, and three principal bedrooms (to the west of the staircase, in the northern block, and at the southern end of the north-south range) consists largely of long and short rectangular panels with quarter-round moulding to stiles and rails. Six-panel doors, boxed beams, and moulded cornices appear throughout, with bolection mouldings to the landing doorways. The panelling to the east of the stairs on the landing is of a different and unusual refined plank and muntin type, also dating from the mid-18th century, and continues alongside the stairs up to the attic.

The western room on the ground floor has a massive chamfered cross beam and a large fireplace to the back wall with a timber lintel and splayed rough stone jambs. A large lateral fireplace in the large room (kitchen) within the north-south range may be secondary, as its jambs partly conceal roughly chamfered cross beams; this fireplace formerly had two smoking ovens. A tile floor is present in both this room and the hall.

The western bedroom contains, in addition to the panelling mentioned above, an inbuilt 18th-century cupboard with carved shelving on the north wall. On the west wall is an elaborate 19th-century fireplace with carved brackets to the mantelshelf; above it hangs a mid-18th-century oil-painted panel depicting a view of Caernarfon with ships in the foreground. The boxing around the cross beam has been removed. A similar bedroom in the northern block is slightly less elaborate and lacks the inbuilt cupboard; its painted panel on the north wall depicts a scene of Conwy. A large room at the south end of the north-south range has panelling only on the east wall and two boxed cross beams. It formerly had a painted panel similar to the others, but this appears to have been removed when the original fireplace was taken out. Wide floorboards are present throughout.

The attic contains simple plank and muntin partitions and substantial A-frame trusses with double purlins: six bays in the north-south range, three bays in the entrance range, and two bays in the northern block.