Parish Church of St Mary

The Parish Church of St Mary is a building of mixed dates, situated within a group value context. The western tower was constructed in the 14th century, utilising rubble masonry with clasping corner buttresses. It features a recessed crenellated parapet with string course and waterspouts to the north and south. Round arched openings to the bell stage are capped with keystones, set within arch rings that rest upon moulded impost blocks and are supported by plain pilasters. Cross-frame louvres sit below a transom, and clock faces are located on the second floor. Round arched windows to the first floor, echoing the bell stage design, have Gothic glazing bars, while slit-like vice lights are positioned to the right on the north side. A bolection moulded string course runs over the plinth. A round arched doorway to the south is constructed from long stone voussoirs.

The main body of the church, a five-bay aisled nave, dates to the 14th century and is built of long, narrow, squared rubble with interlocking projecting quoins. It is topped by a steeply pitched slate roof with a broad cambered leaded apex and a cavetto eaves cornice, all supported by a bolection string course above a rubble plinth. Doorcases are set into the west end of the north and south aisle elevations, featuring round arches capped with keystones, arch rings (missing to the south) supported by moulded impost blocks, and plain pilasters rising from moulded bases. Late 19th-century double doors fill the openings. A slate tablet bearing a Welsh inscription commemorating the 1864 renovation is visible above the south doorframe. Tall, round arched nave windows are similarly detailed to the bell stage, with alternate reveal quoins projecting to form Gibbs-like pilasters, and ovolo moulded sills. Narrow, round arched windows are situated at the west end of the aisles, constructed from stone voussoirs.

A vestry, built in 1828, is integrated into the northwest angle of the tower. It mirrors the masonry of the nave, with a hipped slate roof, a cavetto eaves cornice, clasping pilasters, a bolection string course, and a rubble plinth. Cross windows on the north and south sides match those found on the tower.

The chancel, with an apsidal form, was added in 1864. Constructed in similar masonry to the nave, it features a bolection string course and a flat, leaded apex to its slate roof. Three freestone Romanesque windows are incorporated, with a smaller window centrally located and stepped up, and nookshafts supporting the flanking windows.

Inside, a depressed timber barrel vault spans the entire width of the building, complemented by a modillion cornice. Moulded collars add detail to the octagonal timber arcade piers, with shafts rising over the collars and incorporating moulded square capitals. Early 19th-century inner porches provide access. A good mid-14th-century recumbent effigy of Meuric ap Ynyr Fychan of Nannau has been repositioned below the easternmost window of the north aisle, and a 1726 wall monument to Jane Wynn is also located in the north aisle’s east wall, featuring a segmental pediment and urns. A group of three 18th-century wall monuments belonging to the Nanney family are situated in the south aisle, with one incorporating a 1708 slate tablet displaying a full coat of arms. Numerous other 19th-century monuments are present. Victorian stained glass is found throughout the aisle and chancel, chiefly dating from 1860. An arched recess is present in the west wall, and a font from 1864 stands alongside a smaller, earlier alabaster font bowl dating from 1651. A roll-moulded round chancel arch sits upon corbels, with nookshafts supporting the chancel windows and a half-domed ceiling above. A spiral vice leads to the tower, which houses an 1809 peal of eight bells.