Slaughter-house, dove-cot and smithy at Coed-y-dinas

History: Coed-y-dinas was a home-farm for the Powis Estate by the mid C19 but has earlier origins. Partially remodelled as 'Lord Powis's Model Farm' in the 1870's, various buildings survived from the earlier farm layout, including this building which is probably c1840.

Exterior: Roughly coursed local sandstone rubble with slate roof. 2 storeyed, 4-bay plan. Gable entrance to slaughter house which occupies western bay, with blocked window alongside. Single window with brick arched head to slaughter house set high up in front elevation, which then has paired doorways towards centre. The left-hand door gives access to the dovecote, and has wooden dove-door panel above. The right-hand door gives access to stairs; both are plank doors with simple voussoir heads. Wide double doors with segmental voussoir arch to smithy to the right, and 2-light segmentally headed window alongside. Smaller, lower window is a later insertion. 2 windows above the smithy, immediately below the eaves, one with iron glazing bars to small panes.

Interior: Slaughter house retains a series of axial beams at differing heights from which animals of different sizes were hung; dovecote is lined with nesting holes in brickwork, graded in size from top to bottom. Rooms above the smithy formerly comprised a bothy.

An excellent example of a compactly planned and ingeniously contrived multi-purpose farm-building which retains much of its original character, and forms part of a group of buildings on the farmstead.