12 Ffrydan Road

Nos 4–20 Ffrydan Road (even)

A three-storey terrace of nine late Victorian townhouses, built in two phases around 1890 as a speculative development. The terrace does not appear on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1888, but is present on the second edition of 1901 (surveyed 1899). Its construction reflects the new prosperity and optimism brought to Bala and other rural market towns by the arrival of the railway in the third quarter of the 19th century. The materials employed—engineering and stock bricks—were clearly brought in by rail, demonstrating the shift in the second half of the 19th century from indigenous vernacular building traditions dependent on local materials to more homogenised, geographically non-specific speculative architecture using standardised materials and design.

The terrace is constructed of dark grey engineering brick and yellow stock brick, with yellow, grey and red brick detailing. It has a continuous slate roof with tiled ridge and five chimneys with pots; the chimney to the far left (no. 6) is rendered. The façade is in two distinct stylistic parts. The left half (nos. 4–12) features a façade of engineering bricks with stock and red brick detailing to windows and in the form of decorative banding. The right-hand part (nos. 14–20) is of yellow stock brick with more simplified detailing in engineering brick.

The left half comprises two reflected pairs of units with an extra unit (no. 12) at the right end. Each unit is of two bays, with entrances paired with neighbours except at the end. All have full-height canted bay windows with simple decorative applied timber framing, cusped bargeboards and decorative wooden finials to shallow gables. Windows are plain Victorian cross-windows; no. 12 has modern replacements. Nos. 4 and 6 have narrow round-arched entrances with four-panel doors and plain overlights, with a decorative arched niche above to a blind first floor. The remaining entrances are broader with segmental heads, featuring four-panel doors with narrow flanking glazed panels and plain overlights.

The right-hand part consists of two reflected pairs with paired central and outer entrances. All except no. 18 (centre right) have narrow segmentally-arched openings with four-panel doors and plain overlights. No. 18 has a broader segmentally-arched entrance with a tripartite door and glazed panel arrangement. Each unit has a two-storey canted bay with slated middle and roof, though the roofs to nos. 14 and 16 (left) have been renewed, possibly in lead. Windows throughout are plain Victorian four-pane sashes.

The interior was not inspected at the time of survey.