Llanrhaeadr Hall

Llanrhaeadr Hall

This medium-sized country house is built to a roughly C-plan, comprising a Jacobean-style front section of C-shaped form with a seven-bay Georgian wing extending to the rear. The building is constructed of limestone with slate roofs. The front facade is finished with snecked limestone and limestone dressings, while the rear elevation displays squared, coursed blocks with sandstone dressings. The chimneys are two-stage structures with chamfered sides, cornicing and moulded capping.

The front facade is symmetrical, centred on a three-bay recessed entrance section flanked by advanced, gabled wings. These flanking wings feature scrolled, shaped gables with geometric finials, and the windows are set forward in shallow, full-height bays. The ground and first floors each have single four-light mullioned and transomed windows; the first-floor windows contain 19th-century four-pane glazing in each light, whilst the ground-floor windows are plain-glazed, all with moulded dripstones above. Three-light mullioned windows to the second floor light the attic storey, fitted with four-pane glazing and topped by moulded pediments. The central porch has a scrolled, shaped gable with parapetted flanking bays; the parapets return onto the wings. The entrance itself is a round arch containing sixteen-panel oak double doors with a four-pane segmental overlight. Above the entrance is a two-light window at first-floor level, with a moulded label and moulded stringcourse; this stringcourse continues across the flanking bays and returns onto the wings. The flanking bays contain six-light mullioned and transomed windows to the ground floor and three-light mullioned windows to the first floor, both with moulded labels. In front of the central section, between the wings, a stone-flagged forecourt displays conjoined octagons in the 17th and 18th-century manner. Low 20th-century rubble walls with squat piers and ball finials stand at the front boundary. The side walls are finished with 19th-century tooled, tapering limestone pilasters. The inner roof pitch of the left advanced wing carries a 20th-century catslide dormer.

The rear elevation is a seven-bay symmetrical facade dating from the 1770s. The raised ground floor sits upon a moulded plinth, with a hipped roof behind a sandstone parapet with moulded cornice. The limestone walling was presumably originally stuccoed. Original twelve-pane unhorned sash windows are recessed with simply-moulded sandstone architraves and projecting stone sills; a plain sill course links the ground-floor windows. The central entrance has a full-height architrave matching those of the windows, now fitted with modern French windows and retaining an original six-pane overlight. Access to the entrance is via a flight of six sandstone steps in Perron arrangement, with moulded toes and scrolled ends, fronted by a plain modern iron balustrade. Beneath the steps is a rusticated understair with a three-light barred, segmentally-headed cellar light. Further arched cellar windows with projecting keystones and six-pane modern glazing flank the entrance and occupy the end bays; the cellar window at the far right has been converted to a cellar entrance with modern steps and glazed doors, and modern iron balustrade.

The 1770s wing terminates on its south-east side with a wide, storeyed and canted bay containing sash windows as described. To the left of this, the right-hand wing of the Jacobean front section adjoins. This three-bay section features scrolled gables, the central gable being larger and advanced. Four-light mullioned and transomed windows with moulded labels appear on both ground and first floors of the central bay; three-light windows occupy the outer bays at first-floor level, with two-light windows to the attic floor, the central one topped by a moulded pediment. The north-west service side of the building shows an asymmetrical arrangement of openings. This elevation includes a central six-panel door with recessed modern glazed doors at first-floor level providing fire escape access, and a further similar fire door to the far left serving the raised ground floor of the Georgian wing. Twelve-pane sashes appear on both floors, those to the first floor showing exposed lintels; some are restorations and two occupy reduced openings.

Interior

The entrance hall features a framed ceiling with boxed and plastered beams. Fielded dado panelling extends around the walls, with similar panelled window reveals and shutters. The four doorways leading off the hall are dressed with 18th-century simply-moulded architraves; one to the right is now blocked. A modern fireplace of out-of-character design stands opposite the entrance. Five steps at the rear lead to the raised rear portion of the house, at the top of which are double-sided double doors opening to the principal stairwell. The doors are oak, finished with eight-panel linenfold on the hall side and 18th-century three-panel fielded mahogany on the stair side.

The staircase is an elegant narrow well stair of mahogany with a scrolled end to the swept rail. Stick balusters feature decorated tread-ends. Oak treads and risers are accompanied by fielded dado panelling running up the staircase and around the stairwell walls. A simple modillion cornice runs beneath the ceiling, which is decorated with applied 19th-century Jacobean strapwork. At the first-floor stairhead is a moulded, depressed-arched opening now fitted with modern doors and partitioning. Leading off the stairwell to right and left are fine six-panel mahogany doors. The left-hand door opens to a modern corridor with a short-flight Jacobean-style stair featuring flat, pierced balusters and geometric newels. The right-hand door provides access to the Drawing Room.

The Drawing Room contains a painted Adamesque wooden chimneypiece with grey figured marble surround. An Adam-style swag frieze and cornice decorate the walls, with similar overdoors featuring pilasters ornamented with palmettes and plaques. The dado is panelled, with panelled shutters and reveals.

The front left ground-floor room features an 1840s figured grey marble fireplace with segmental arch and simple mantelshelf supported on pilasters. The corresponding right-hand room displays a compartmented Jacobethan ceiling with geometrical ribbing and moulded segmental arches flanking a central Adamesque fireplace, with a 1770s painted steel grate.