Circular cow-house at Gwaunclawdd is a Grade II* listed building in the Powys local planning authority area, Wales. First listed on 17 January 1963. Workhouse infirmary, nurses’ home.
Circular cow-house at Gwaunclawdd
- WRENN ID
- pale-cinder-rush
- Grade
- II*
- Local Planning Authority
- Powys
- Constituency
- Brecon, Radnor and Cwm Tawe MP: David Chadwick (LD)
- Country
- Wales
- Date first listed
- 17 January 1963
- Type
- Workhouse infirmary, nurses’ home
- Address
- Circular cow-house at Gwaunclawdd, Abercraf, Ystradgynlais
- OS grid reference
- SN 810 122
- Coordinates
- 51.79627, -3.72666
- Source
- Cadw listing
Description
The circular cow-house at Gwaunclawdd is a Grade II* listed structure. It is built from rubble stone and features slate roofs. The design includes a two-storey inner cylinder topped with a conical roof, which has a leaded ball finial, and two lean-tos with sloping roofs. The entrances to the inner cylinder are positioned opposite each other.
Each entrance bay features a broad loft door with a timber lintel and double boarded doors above a narrower ground floor door, which is framed by stone voussoirs. The lean-tos surrounding the structure have blank walls, with their end walls splayed into the entrances of the central cylinder, and the angles are curved. There are extensive areas of collapse present.
Inside, the central section has a cobbled ground floor and a loft above. There are four cambered-headed doors leading from the centre to the outer lean-tos, making a total of ten openings around the structure, including the opposed doors. The lean-tos also have cobbled floors with drainage channels. The conical roof is supported by radial tie-beams connected to a king-post with raking struts, while the lean-tos feature tie-beams and rafter roofs.
Local climate
Circular cow-house at Gwaunclawdd sits in one of the wettest parts of the UK, with an average of 1,460 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 98% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 94% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 47 freeze-thaw cycles a year, more than 88% of listed buildings. Of these, 25 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
More on this building
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- No EPC on record for this property
- No sale records on file
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- Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
- Flood risk assessment
- Radon risk assessment
- Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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