Cwrt Bryn y Beirdd

Cwrt Bryn y Beirdd is a Grade II* listed house of considerable architectural interest, combining medieval and later features. The main range is built of colourwashed rubble stone with slate roofs, hipped at the north end and close-eaved, with later 19th-century brick chimney stacks (two on the ridge and one at the south end).

The long west front is two storeys tall and four windows wide. The window openings have brick heads, mostly of later 19th-century date. From left to right: the first bay contains a ground floor square boarded window and a 20th-century plastic first floor window (formerly 4-pane), set further right. In the second bay projects what appears to have been a 16th-century storeyed porch, though no door survives. The upper floor is corbelled and the slates are carried down over it. A 20th-century 9-pane window sits under the eaves with a 16-pane ground floor window below. The third bay has 19th-century 4-pane sashes on each floor, the ground floor example being larger, with one of the ridge stacks positioned to its right. A later 19th-century gabled porch in squared grey stone and yellow brick, with bargeboards, follows. This porch has a pointed door on its north side and a 20th-century 12-pane window to the front. The final section to the right has a first floor 4-pane sash above the porch roof-slope and a larger ground floor 4-pane sash further right, above which sits a fine medieval blocked cusped lancet.

The south gable end displays an external chimneybreast corbelled out above the low ground floor, possibly of 16th-century date, with a blocked cusped medieval lancet beneath the corbels. 20th-century first floor windows occupy each side, and a ground floor 4-pane window is positioned to the right. A wall runs south from the southwest corner to join the corner of an outbuilding. The north end is hipped, with a first floor square loft opening and a casement pair to the ground floor left, both boarded with timber lintels.

The northeast rear wing contains a medieval upper hall. It is built of whitewashed rubble stone with a metal-sheet roof cladding and one small stone ridge stack. The north side shows a straight joint to the main house, a sloping buttress at its left end, and three narrow cusped lancets to the first floor (the centre one larger), with small square boarded windows to the ground floor (centre and left), the latter being larger. The east gable is windowless but shows signs of a blocked first floor opening on the left (shown square-headed in an 1858 view). The south side, facing the courtyard, has late 19th-century openings: a large first floor cambered-headed fixed 12-pane window, a small boarded window to the right, and a ground floor coach-entry with a cambered brick arch and double doors. A plank door occupies the centre, and within an open lean-to at the left is a segmental arched entry, possibly of late medieval date. An 1858 view shows small square openings on each floor to the right, a narrow square-headed door to the left, and a pointed window to the first floor; however, the opening into the stairs was formerly from within a gabled storeyed porch on the back of the main range, since removed.

The rear of the house has lean-to additions. An open porch to the right (on the site of the lost storeyed porch) contains a boarded door and a 4-pane window over; some corbelling in the upper wall may be remains of the porch structure. To the left is a stone lean-to with a ground floor small 4-pane window, 20th-century door, and enlarged 20th-century window. One small square upper window sits to the left of the door. A rubble stone north end wall contains a stone stack, raised in yellow brick (shown as brick in the 1858 view, at which date the lean-to was single-storey; the present front wall stonework appears 19th-century). To the right is a further lean-to partly against the house left end (possibly obscuring a door with a large pointed window over, shown in the 1858 view) and partly against the wall between the house and outbuilding, with a cart-entry of double doors to the right, a door to the centre, and a window to the right.

The northeast rear wing is entered from within the lean-to via a flight of ten stone steps to the first floor. Signs of a lost stone spiral stair with a blocked pointed door west into the main house first floor and a slit window east over the entry remain visible. The first floor comprises a three-bay section with two axial beams, then a stone wall with one bay beyond. Three fine medieval roof trusses survive, each chamfered with a cambered collar and trefoil cusping in the apex, dating to the late 14th or early 15th century. Some smoke blackening is visible on the chimney-wall truss, but the structure was probably not originally an open-hearth building. There is no windbracing. The end room has the jamb of a pointed window or door in the gable wall to the right. The ground floor contains a fireplace with a timber lintel, and the 1858 plan shows a ground floor fireplace with a bread oven.

The main house north end rooms are used for storage. The first floor room (possibly the great parlour named in 1613 documents) has a fine 16th-century blocked fireplace of whitewashed ashlar with chamfered jambs and a cambered arched head projecting on shaped corbels; similar shaped corbels project each side. Traces of wall paintings—vertical blue-grey stripes—are visible up to dado height. The room below has a blocked fireplace with stone voussoirs to the cambered head. The 1858 plan shows a fireplace and narrow access into the southeast corner from the east porch.

The interior of the rest of the house was not available for inspection, but is reported to be entirely altered in the later 19th century, with 19th-century roof trusses. The 1858 plan shows two rooms: one including the west front projection (not then a porch), partitioned, with stairs on the back wall, a fireplace on the south wall, and a lost small window in the angle to the projection. The south end room had narrow (possibly medieval) windows on the west and south walls, a window into the lean-to, and a door to the outside on the east wall.