Llanfair-Isaf Farmhouse

Llanfair-Isaf Farmhouse

An irregular T-shaped group comprising a main range aligned north-south, with a secondary hall house (known as the hendy) abutting its north-west corner, and an early 19th-century wing projecting from the rear. The complex represents a characteristic pattern of agricultural domestic building with later domestic additions.

The main range is two storeys, built of rubble roughly brought to courses with a slate roof. End wall stacks of massive proportions rise above the upper storey. The west-facing entrance elevation features a doorway with riven stone voussoirs to the arch, leading to a central through-passage. Windows are small-paned sashes: a 20-pane sash to the main room and 16-pane sashes elsewhere, possibly dating from early 19th-century alterations. A similar doorway is aligned in the rear wall, with 12-pane sash windows on each floor to its left. The added cart-shed to the rear is of better-coursed stone with a hipped slate roof, containing two cart bays at ground floor separated by a central pillar and topped by slate lintels. External stairs lead to a first-floor doorway with a small window alongside and loft above. A 12-pane sash window lights the first floor in the rear elevation, with a blind-painted window below.

The hall house or hendy stands at right angles to the front of the main dwelling. It is more simply constructed in virtually dry-stone with small packing stones in the joints, roofed in slate with a single chimney at one end. A near-central doorway has riven stone voussoirs. Small windows with stone lintels flank the entrance. A former stable, now converted to cottage, is attached to the gable end and is two storeys with an external staircase against the gable wall leading to the former loft. The added porch contains a central doorway flanked by 12-pane sash windows, with a small window above.

The Georgian wing to the east is finished in finely coursed and dressed stonework with a slate roof of pronounced overhang, hipped on one side. An axial chimney rises through the roof. The main elevation is symmetrical, presenting the appearance of an independent dwelling with a central front door set within a porch with flat moulded cornice and traceried overlight, flanked by 16-pane sash windows.

Interior of the main range

The principal room, or hall, occupies the upper bay, with paired smaller rooms at the lower end. A wide central through-passage was created by re-siting the original hall partition. A dog-leg staircase of early 17th-century type with splat balusters rises to the rear of the passage. Stop-chamfered joists to the passage ceiling mirror those of the hall, indicating the space was once a single room. The hall partition survives as post and panel, though at the front of the house a small 19th-century pantry with tongue-and-groove boarded walls replaced this section.

The principal room features a fine ceiling with stop-chamfered main beams and similarly chamfered characteristically flat joists. The two beams lie against the partition and corbel out from the fireplace wall, with the fireplace bressumer immediately behind. The fireplace has been partly filled in with two cupboards flanking the existing hearth. At the lower end, the original division into two small rooms survives. The rear room functioned as a heated parlour and retains a blocked fireplace. The front room, unheated, has unchamfered flat joists denoting its lesser status, and a fine oak 4-panelled door. The stone wall separating these rooms from the passage may be an insertion, appearing awkwardly underbuilt with a timber beam above, suggesting the original post-and-panel partition between passage and hall may once have occupied this position.

Upstairs, post-and-panel partitions separate the central landing from two principal rooms, with evidence of a further partition creating a third central room. One upper room features a shaped doorhead and heavy doorway, now removed. Very substantial collar-beam trusses are partially visible within walls flanking the landing and across the upper room.

Interior of the hall house (hendy)

A large partially blocked fireplace stands at the gable end, with traces of a blocked first-floor window at the corner where it meets the main dwelling. Two fine upper cruck trusses and three tie-beams cross the space, one apparently a crude later insertion. The tie-beam closest to the fireplace contains slots for joists, suggesting a possible upper floor. The right-hand truss has mortices for a partition, indicating this apparently single space was originally subdivided.

Interior of the Georgian wing

This wing is planned as an independent house lacking service accommodation but connecting directly with the hall (kitchen) of the original dwelling. It comprises two parlours and a small central stairhall. The staircase features stick balusters, swept rail and moulded tread ends, with a half-landing to bathroom etc in a rear outshut. The right-hand parlour has a fireplace on the left wall in a recess repeated on other outer walls, finished with Gothick detail cast-iron grate and moulded (possibly painted slate) surround. The left-hand parlour contains a similar recessed fireplace with a china-cupboard alongside. Both parlours and bedrooms above retain reed-moulded cornices with angle rosettes and original joinery detail.