Tyn-Dwr

Tyn-Dwr

Tudor black and white style building, totally asymmetrical and irregular in plan, mainly two-storey with attic. It is constructed in red brick with freestone dressings and gables, the first floor of the main elevations featuring applied half-timbering with panelled ornamentation. The roof is slate with distinctive stellar pattern red brick chimney stacks, gable finials and overhanging eaves.

The north-facing front comprises four bays with a large gable to the left, a small gable to the right and a three-storey gabled porch to the centre. The left-hand bay also features a splayed oriel. The windows are two, three and four-light stone mullioned designs, transomed to the ground floor. These include examples with cusping, stained glass, and an ogee design. A stilted segmental arched entrance with dropped keystone leads to panelled double doors surrounded by stained glass panels.

The east side has three bays with an advanced gabled bay to the left and a freestone squared bay to the right with a crenellated parapet and cusped lights with transom. The south side is only half-timbered on the first floor and includes a splayed bay and oriel. A four-light cusped stairwell window to the left has stone mullions and transom.

A two-storey red brick tower with crenellated parapet stands in the angle to the left. To the southwest extends a range with similar detail including a black and white gable. Set back and stepped down beyond this is a two-storey red brick service range on the same axis, featuring cross frame windows. The west side has further black and white gables and a square four-stage tower at the angle, also with crenellated parapets.

The northwest side of the service range includes a small bell tower and a chimney stack with latticework banding to the middle. An attached octagonal brick game larder and meat store with lucarnes to its pyramidal roof completes the exterior.

The interior is rich in lavish decorative detail. The four-centred arched porch opens onto a wainscotted hall lit by stained glass, with Victorian flock wallpaper to the frieze and floral plasterwork to the panelled ceiling. A French chateau style chimneypiece features a stepped hood, foliage spandrels and a segmental outer arch carried on detached fluted composite columns, with red and gold tilework and putti at either end of the grate.

A broad stairwell to the rear contains a pine staircase with pendants and plaster detail to the underside of the upper flight. The balustrade has cusped ogee arches, with a panelled dado and exuberant plaster ceiling; an elaborate frieze extends to the left.

The room to the right of the hall features a green marble chimneypiece with Adamesque grate. The dining room to the left is executed in seventeenth-century manner with a busily decorated plaster ceiling displaying varying ribbed patterns and a deep stucco frieze with sub-Adamesque detail. Its chimneypiece has paired male and female terms to the mantelpiece and fluted columns above. The drawing room has simpler detail and an alabaster chimneypiece with recessed fluted columns and classical female figures in shallow niches, with mosaic detail to the splayed sides incorporating later seventeenth-century figures. Further stained glass appears in this room. A studied fireplace with tile detail is located in the rear office. The first floor billiard room features a massive chimneypiece rising to ceiling level with terms above and below the mantelpiece and cherubs hiding under scallop shells, executed in Italianate style with foliage carving.

Restoration was in progress at the time of inspection in February 1989.