Llanelly House

Llanelly House (comprising Nos 2 and 4 and Nos 20, 22 and 24 Vaughan Street, Bridge Street, south side)

A major early 18th-century house of three storeys, built of rubble stone rendered in stucco with a low-pitched slate roof behind a parapet. The main facade spans seven bays arranged in a 1-2-1-2-1 rhythm with three forward breaks. The upper floors remain very little altered. The top floor features 24-pane sashes with oblong blank panels above, while the first floor has 18-pane sashes, all with exposed boxes and some retaining original glazing. The parapet is finished with painted stone moulded coping and seven ornate stone urns, with the central pair more elaborate. The three projected bays display very ornate painted timber carved modillion cornices below the second floor sills.

The ground floor has been considerably rearranged. A stone string course survives over the first three bays. The first two bays contain 20th-century plate glass windows in probably 19th-century moulded stucco surrounds. The third bay has a modern door with overlight in plain timber architrave. The centre bay retains an off-centre 18-pane sash, while to its right stands a tall door with fielded panels and glazed top panel, neither aligned with the window above. The final two bays feature a late 19th-century shopfront of two panes with slim column shafts, framed in a late 19th-century applied shopfront with fluted Corinthian pilasters at each end and a long entablature. The recession of the fifth and sixth bays has been lost in these alterations. The facade contains two symmetrically placed lead downpipes with rainwater heads of exceptional quality, dated 1714. The pipe to the left is complete; that to the right survives except at ground floor level.

The west end wall has a parapet ramped up to the centre with corner urns. It features two 15-pane upper windows, one matching the first floor left window and one blank window to the right, plus a late 19th-century ground floor shopfront matching the main front. A matching lead rainwater head and pipe are present.

Rendered stacks to the left and centre show evidence of originally being red brick and arcaded, with a formerly third stack to the right.

Nos 20 and 22 Vaughan Street form a former rear wing projecting slightly forward of the main house end wall. This is two storeys, stuccoed with a slate roof, brick south end stack, and brick stack on the rear east roof. Four original 15-pane large sashes with stone sills light the first floor. The ground floor has been wholly altered by circa 1980 with a double shopfront clad in polished black and grey stone with metal-framed windows.

Interior

Despite years of neglect, Llanelly House retains very extensive areas of original panelling, extending over almost the entire first floor, including the Vaughan Street wing. The panelling is of tall fielded panels over a moulded dado rail with fielded panels below, and fielded panelling extends to window seats throughout. Simple moulded cornices are present.

The main first floor front room of four bays has complete panelling but later 18th-century fireplaces. The south fireplace wall is enriched with fluted pilasters. The first floor corridor contains three fine panelled and moulded arches with fluted pilasters, panelled spandrels, keystones, and cornices. The east end of the first floor and second floor of the main house were not inspected.

The wide stair hall, built in the angle behind the two ranges, features a rich modillion cornice in timber and plaster. A second floor gallery retains original bobbin-turned balusters. The open-well main stair appears to be of later date, though a fine moulded and panelled arched doorway on the east side of the half-landing appears original, as does a similarly detailed but narrow viewing archway on the west wall, now blanked off behind bobbin-turned balustrade.

The Vaughan Street wing contains one small panelled room with one window to Vaughan Street and three painted grisaille over-door panels, and one larger room to the south with two windows, fully panelled. The original south wall fireplace features a pulvinated laurel-leaf frieze, with panelled doors to a recessed cupboard to the right. A later staircase in the south east angle descends to the ground floor. Behind the smaller panelled room is a stair to the attic, not inspected.

Ground floors are more fragmentary but retain considerable amounts of panelling. In the main range, the left room appears to have most of its panelling surviving behind modern boxing, and a painted overmantel is revealed depicting an idealised coastal scene with classical temples and British fleet. A moulded plaster ceiling was accidentally destroyed in 1990. The passage in the third bay is plain. The remaining four bays, presumably the original entrance hall and large north west room, now form a single shop, with original panelling on the east wall and one moulded and panelled archway on the east wall adjoining a similar south wall archway through to the stair hall. Ceilings are divided into panels by plastered beams, some with probably original simple decoration to panels. Further panelling and a large fireplace survive in No 22 Vaughan Street, currently boxed in.

The building requires further historic and archaeological investigation, but appears internally to contain to a remarkable extent the original fittings of a major early 18th-century house.