Berthymaen

Berthymaen

A 2-storey house of rubble stone with a slate roof behind coped gables, constructed with a T-shaped plan. The building comprises a main range with a parlour wing to the southeast, a lower 19th-century wing to the left, and a secondary dwelling at right angles at the left end.

The southeast elevation features a parlour wing to the centre, with a segmental-headed hall window in the lower storey and a stone-lintelled window above it. Set back on the right side of the parlour wing is a pebble-dashed lean-to porch with boarded door and casement window above. The gable end of the wing displays stone-lintelled windows in both storeys, between which is a cement tablet inscribed with the date 1643. The left-hand return wall of the wing contains blocked 2-light mullioned windows in the lower and upper right, and a blocked window in a dressed surround at the upper left. A small dressed stair light stands in the angle with the left side of the main range. The main range has a moulded lintel to a boarded door with 2-light mullioned overlight, and a first-floor window under a wedge lintel.

The lower 19th-century wing added to the left gable end has a brick-segmental-headed window at lower right, with its rear wall containing two windows with segmental heads in the lower storey. Behind this wing, the gable end of the main range displays a blocked, formerly mullioned kitchen window and a lintelled window above. The rear of the main range is dominated by an external kitchen stack to the right of centre. To its right is a wood-lintelled window, and on the left side an inserted glazed door and segmental-headed window. The upper storey has two stone-lintelled windows.

At right angles at the left end stands a lower 2-storey secondary dwelling, projecting beyond the right gable end of the main range. Built of rubble stone with a renewed slate roof and tall end stack to the right, its front facing the rear of the main house features a 17th-century lintelled head to a boarded door, a blocked small window to the right in a dressed stone surround, and a segmental-headed window to the left. Further left is a blocked 2-light mullioned window, below a similar window in the upper storey. The left-hand gable end has a blocked upper-storey window under a 17th-century lintel, partly obscured by an added stable set back against the gable end. This stable has a rubble-stone wall with barred opening and brick gable end. Openings were cut into the rear of the secondary dwelling in the 19th century, which is now the front of the building and is beneath a canopy with corrugated asbestos-cement roof. It has a boarded door to the left and a segmental-headed window to the right of centre. The former stable has a brick wall with a wide full-height opening.

Windows throughout are 2-light casements replacing earlier openings. The building has lateral and end chimney stacks.

The interior plan is unusual, as the main doorway opens into a stair hall containing an early staircase with moulded hand rail, polygonal newel, and replaced plain balusters. A passage leads to the hall at the right end, which has a wide fireplace under a stone segmental head. The joist-beam ceiling features roll-moulded beams with broach stops, similar to the kitchen. The kitchen has a lateral, ovolo-moulded stone fireplace. The parlour has ovolo-moulded beams with ogee stops, and its fireplace features ovolo mouldings to the stone jambs with the lintel projecting on brackets.