Bodlondeb

Bodlondeb

A domestic-revival style former country house of 2 storeys and attic, dating to 1877. The walls are snecked rock-faced stone with freestone dressings, under steep tile roofs on overhanging eaves with prominent lead finials and rock-faced stone stacks. The main house forms a rectangular double-depth block with separate roof spans for each elevation. Offset in the middle above the entrances is a higher near-square lantern with bands of glazing in each face and a steep hipped roof bearing the date 1877, with finial and weathervane. Windows are mainly 2-pane horned sashes in freestone surrounds, with the upper storey windows having a moulded sill band. Main elevations retain original cast-iron rainwater heads and downpipes with lozenge-pattern decoration.

The main entrance front faces southwest and is asymmetrical of 7 unequal bays. The entrance is right of centre in bay 5, at the centre of a lower 2-storey section of 3 bays. It has a lean-to timber-framed half-glazed porch on a stone dwarf wall with turned angle posts and moulded mullions and transoms to leaded glazing. Central double doors have boarded panels, with a mullioned overlight incorporating a central cusped circle. The bays right and left of the entrance (bays 4 and 6) have pairs of windows with replacement pivoting lights, and single windows above flanking a triple sash window over the porch. The wider gabled right-end bay (bay 7) has 2 sash windows of 2 over 1 panes flanking a central buttress. The first-floor oriel window sits on freestone corbelling incorporating a foliage frieze, with 2 segmental-headed sash windows above which are 4 freestone mullioned panels with flowers in high relief. The oriel has a lean-to roof, above which the freestone gable is panelled with low-relief foliage and lozenge patterns and incorporating a round central panel. Bays 2 and 3 on the left side of the entrance section are higher, 2 storeys and attic, with gambrel roof over bay 3. Bay 3 has paired sash windows in ground and first floors, and paired sashes to an attic half-dormer under a lean-to roof against a set-back gable with disc-pattern freestone panel. Bay 2 is narrower with single sash windows in ground and first floors and attic skylight. The first bay is higher, wider and gabled, balancing the right end bay. It has a coped gable on moulded kneelers with ground and first-floor windows and an attic 2-light mullioned window with sashes beneath a pointed tympanum with freestone panelling of foliage and lozenges in similar style to bay 7, and moulded sill band with foliage stops.

The asymmetrical southeast front is 4 unequal bays with a lean-to veranda against bays 3-4 on turned wooden posts on stone bases with simple brackets. At the ends it has trusses with openwork tracery, and the right end has stone steps. The central full-height canted bay window (bay 3) has replacement French doors and glazing in the ground floor, with a wooden 3-light mullioned-and-transomed window to the first floor with leaded glazing above the transom. The bay window has a lean-to roof against a panelled gable with finial, similar to the freestone gables of the entrance front. Bay 1 has a replacement floor-length cross window, and bay 2 a glazed door (originally opening to a conservatory shown on the 1889 Ordnance Survey) below 2-pane sash windows on the first floor. The ground-floor windows open to a former terrace. Bay 4 contains an external stack.

The northeast front mirrors the southwest front in overall structure, though the details differ with only 2 bays in the lower entrance section. The 2-storey entrance section has a pointed arch with continuous chamfer and hood mould, with a pair of contemporary wrought-iron gates with overthrow. Inside the porch is a boarded door with strap hinges, side and overlights with wooden mullions and transoms and leaded coloured glass. Above, the entrance bay has 2 sash windows, and the narrow bay on its left side has single sashes. The first bay is a broad full-height canted bay window with 2 sashes under a steep hipped roof with ornate finial. Bays 4 and 5 have a higher roof line with hipped roof over bay 4. Bay 4 has a broad canted bay window with parapet and 2 sash windows in the ground floor, above which are 2 windows and a single window to a hipped half-dormer with moulded brick finial. Bay 5 has single windows and a similar half-dormer with finial. The wider gabled bay 6 has 2 windows in ground and first floors, with a 3-light mullioned attic window incorporating 8-pane sashes under a pointed arch with hood mould and freestone panelled tympanum similar to those of the front elevation.

The northwest side has 1-storey advanced wings. Above them, the main range has a central 3-light mullioned attic window with raised eaves and a lean-to roof against a panelled freestone gable with finial. The 1-storey projections comprise 3 parallel ranges, of which the central is higher under a gambrel roof with 4 skylights in its southwest roof slope. The southwest front is 3 bays with an altered central bay, now the main entrance to council offices, with glazed doors and a high entrance canopy. The right-hand bay has 2 cross windows of frosted glass under a steep timber-framed gable with incised sun and foliage patterns in the plaster and ridge tiles and moulded finial. The left-hand bay has a 3-light mullioned and transomed window with fixed lights and lean-to roof against a steep gable with raised eaves, moulded finial and ridge tiles (the gable may originally have been decorated similar to the right-hand bay but is now blank render). The opposite 3-window northeast side has irregular fenestration. On the left side is a 3-light mullioned window incorporating 8-pane horned sashes framed by a steep hipped roof with finial, subsidiary to a broader hipped roof with finials. Next right is a 2-light broad mullioned window with replacement glazing and a similar 1-light window to the right end. A stack is left of centre.

Interior

Entrances from the southwest and northeast fronts have vestibules with half-glazed screens and doors incorporating leaded coloured glass. The overlight to the southwest main entrance incorporates an 'AW' monogram.

A central full-height entrance hall has a panelled wainscot and moulded door surrounds with panelled boarded doors. A freestone Gothic fireplace in the southeast wall has a segmental arch and foliage cornice, above which are 3 foliage panels with the central incorporating in raised letters 'AW 1877', the left-hand 'GSW' and right-hand 'PW'. The overmantel sits on corbelled shafts. An open-well stairway on the northwest side of the hall has turned and relief-moulded newels, turned balusters on a moulded string and panelled dado. The stairway is top-lit separately from the lantern over the hall. The lantern has moulded brackets on corbels supporting etched glass panels.

The first floor has a 4-sided gallery on corbelled brackets with panelled front incorporating open quatrefoil panels below balusters. Facing the stair the gallery has a 3-bay screen of turned posts to bracketed relief-moulded timber lintel. Above the gallery is a string course and corbelled moulded brackets to the central lantern. The lantern has leaded glazing with coloured glass to upper lights and panelled sides and ceiling. A first-floor corridor leading off to the northwest side and a small lobby on the northeast side have segmental arches on foliage brackets.