Adjoining Cottage including Forecourt Walls to W and adjoining outbuilding

Adjoining Cottage including Forecourt Walls to W and Adjoining Outbuilding

A substantial mid-Victorian villa in gabled Gothic style, set within a complex of associated structures including a 16th-century house, a 19th-century cottage conversion, and various outbuildings.

Main House

The principal building is a large, irregular villa of two-and-a-half storeys, constructed of rubble with limestone dressings, string-courses and steeply-pitched slate roofs. The north-facing entrance front has three gabled sections. The central section projects prominently as a tall storeyed porch with a steep crow-stepped gable topped with stone capping. The original chamfered Tudor-arched entrance was converted in the later 19th century to a 3-light wooden cusped tracery window. A later entrance with a panelled Victorian door was added to the east return. Above the porch stands a rectangular wooden oriel composed of re-used, highly-carved 19th-century Indian elements with carved posts and pierced foliate screen sections. The oriel features a 4-light leaded window and a shallow lead ogee roof, supported on decorative brackets. Above this sits a recessed sandstone heraldic plaque. To the left, set back slightly, a high gabled section rises with pierced foliate bargeboards and deep verges. 2-light rectangular windows to the first and second floors have splayed reveals; the second-floor window is a 20th-century steel-framed replacement. The ground floor has a later 19th-century triple-arched porch or loggia with Tudor-arched openings, the central one serving as an entrance. A rustic balustrade with a central pier bearing a heraldic plaque is surmounted by a stone ball-finial; a similar smaller finial crowns the corner pier to the left. The right gabled section is broader and lower, and represents work by Madocks dating to circa 1800, with plain bargeboards and deep verges. 19th-century fenestration includes a 3-light wooden mullioned window to the ground floor with heraldic stained glass to the upper sections, two 6-pane recessed casement windows to the first floor, and a similar 4-pane window to the gable apex.

The east side faces a terrace overlooking the Afon Mawddach, arranged in three bays. The central bay is advanced with a crow-stepped gable that is kneelered and coped, with an off-set finial to the apex; chamfered corners occur at first-floor level. To the right, behind the gable, stands a large stack with heavily-moulded capping. 2-light wooden mullioned windows light the ground floors of the flanking bays, whilst a 3-light cross-window serves the central gabled bay; a modern window has been inserted in the gable apex. The rear (south) side includes a gabled section to the right with a storeyed timber-framed bay window featuring decorative framing to its upper section. A further, smaller section to the left displays similar upper treatment with a projecting gablet. To the left of this stands a 4-storey tower with crenellations and decorative machicolations; it is now flat-roofed, though it formerly carried a lead spire. A single-storey 20th-century conservatory extension has been added to the left (west).

The 16th-century House

Abutting the main villa to the west at the rear is a 16th-century house consisting of a rectangular gabled block with a large gabled and slate-roofed lateral chimney to the north-west corner, creating an L-plan. A 2-tier 19th-century chimney has been added. The structure is single-storey plus attic, built of rubble with a renewed slate roof. Modern windows have been installed on the ground floor of the south side, whilst two 6-pane 19th-century casements light the gable above. Original window openings survive to the west side, the right one now converted to a modern French window. A further original opening faces east towards the conservatory. A modern fire escape has been installed to the upper north gable.

Associated Outbuildings and Structures

A wooden and corrugated iron lean-to adjoins the 16th-century house to the west. Abutting this to the south-west is a small semi-circular rubble turret with a square continuation to the north, containing a water tank. The turret displays blind cross-loop openings and crenellations with a boarded door to the south. A sloped, slate-coped rubble wall extends east for 5 metres, terminating opposite the west wall of the main house. Two further single-storey ranges adjoin to the north: the furthest, an outbuilding formerly used as stables, has three boarded doors and two windows to its east side. The other is an external water closet block, built in similar rubble construction.

A single-storey service range adjoins the main house to the north-west, built of rubble with a modern door and window. To the right are two wide Tudor-arched 4-light windows. A rustic balustrade crowns the flat roof. Modern additions have been made to the rear. This range curves in a shallow arc northwards. In front lies an open rustic arcade of seven arches, the two northernmost ones stepped-down, which screens the west side of the forecourt. The service range terminates in a half-round turret with a blind cross-loop, matching the turret at the junction with the cottage.

The Cottage

The cottage represents a 19th-century domestic remodelling of an earlier (16th- or 17th-century) barn. It is constructed of rubble with a steeply-pitched slate roof. Two 2-light wooden mullioned windows with cusped heads light the ground floor of the long north side facing the drive, with two gabled dormers above, each containing a narrow rectangular 4-pane door-light. An upper loading bay in the west gable is accessed by external stone steps. Deep verges feature plain bargeboards and a projecting decorative gable truss. A 4-pane arched-headed sash window lights the gable. An off-centre chimney displays weather coursing. The interior has been modernised.

Forecourt Walls

Rubble walls with slate coping enclose the forecourt to the west.

Interior of Main House

A long, high entrance hall features a decorative plaster ceiling with bosses around the cornice. A narrow oak well stair with barley-twist balusters ascends, its quadruple-clustered newel posts topped with cup-and-cover finials. A similar straight flight serves the second floor. Good stained and pressed glass in the stair-well, executed in 13th-century style with heraldic panels at the top displaying the Williams arms, together with figure subjects, illuminates this space.

The drawing room fireplace is of slate with a round-arched opening and acanthus brackets supporting the mantelpiece. Four stained glass panels occupy the upper lights of the rear canted bay, composed of fragments of late Medieval glass (chiefly late 15th- or early 16th-century) supplemented with 19th-century coloured glass.

The dining room contains re-located 19th-century dado panelling with Renaissance-style shallow relief carving. The fireplace is Tudor-arched with glazed ceramic tiles and enamelled fleurs-de-lis plaques; fragments of Pugin-design wall paper flank the fireplace. A geometric ribbed ceiling of conjoined octagons and squares crowns the room. This room forms part of an apparently 17th-century wing added to the primary 16th-century core, substantially remodelled circa 1800 and later by Williams. A large fireplace ingle-beam with chamfering is said to survive on the west wall, though it is obscured by later plaster.

A short corridor leads from the dining room to the primary block, which is stepped down approximately 1 metre from the main house. To the left of the corridor stands a large square mass of rubble masonry containing a corkscrew stair rising to the second floor. The primary block comprises a 2-bay hall and a single-bay parlour at ground-floor level, now combined as one room, though evidence of the former partition screen survives on the southernmost transverse ceiling beam. A heavily-beamed ceiling, a mid-17th-century insertion into a former open hall, displays stopped-chamfered detail. Stopped-chamfered timber lintels frame the splayed windows. The hall fireplace has been reduced and features a modern bressummer. A pair of cruck blades, plastered over, is visible in the first-floor room, originally the upper part of the open hall.