Hafod y Garreg

Hafod y Garreg is a house dating to the 18th century, constructed of rubble stone, originally whitewashed, with a slate roof and stone stacks. A large square ridge stack is positioned towards the right, accompanied by a smaller stack at the right end. The building has one and a half storeys. The section to the left of the ridge stack has a double-fronted design, featuring small gables with 6-pane windows and ground floor windows with 9 panes on each side of a half-glazed double door, now set within a late 20th-century porch-conservatory. A similar 9-pane ground floor window is located between the chimneys. Stone sills, stone lintels, and stone dripstones are present, appearing to be renewed. The right end wall incorporates a first-floor window with stone voussoirs above and a ground-floor stone-tiled lean-to to the right of a 20th-century greenhouse. The rear elevation has a 9-pane window to the left and a smaller window to the right.

Entry to the house is into a central room featuring a massive fireplace at the lower end and a partially-complete post-and-panel partition at the upper end. Smaller rooms extend beyond the partition, having previously served as dairies and a scullery. A narrow lower end room lies beyond the main chimney, incorporating an end fireplace.

The central room's fireplace is exceptionally large, with a lintel measuring approximately 2 meters in depth. A bread oven is integrated within the fireplace. A door to the left has a cambered oak lintel, chamfered below with an ogee point in the centre. A remnant of a winding stair is also present. A beam in the centre of the room is hollow-chamfered on the downhill side, supported by chamfered square joists between this side and a similar beam over the fireplace. Rough square joists are visible on the uphill side, leading to a partition, although the original position of the partition is uncertain. The post-and-panel partition has an ogee moulding and is incomplete, lacking its original end doors. A 20th-century staircase now occupies the space.

The lower room features a small fireplace with a timber lintel and a front beam with a hollow chamfer. The upper end rooms were formerly used as a dairy and pantry, with rough beams and square joists.

On the first floor, a large chimney is prominently positioned downhill of the landing. In the end room, a cruck truss of exceptional complexity is exposed. It includes arch braces to a high collar and a centre post below, from which diagonal struts branch out, slightly cusped, forming trefoil heads with the cusped undersides of the arched braces over two plastered panels. The centre post is further embellished with small bosses or knobs on either side, and arch braces to the foot, presumably off a tie-beam, though the tie-beam itself is not clearly visible. Heavy smoke blackening is evident. The truss’s form indicates that the roof eaves were later raised. A corner fireplace has stone voussoirs.

On the opposite side of the chimney, a door leads to the head of the former winding stair. The roof in this section is supported by collar trusses with vertical posts beneath the feet, transferring weight to tie beams below, and rough purlins dating to the late 18th or early 19th century.