Survey Data

Reg No

11814128


Rating

Regional


Categories of Special Interest

Archaeological, Architectural, Historical, Social


Original Use

Castle/fortified house


In Use As

House


Date

1710 - 1750


Coordinates

289428, 219413


Date Recorded

23/05/2002


Date Updated

--/--/--


Description

Detached three-bay two- and three-storey house, c.1730, on an irregular plan retaining early aspect incorporating fabric of tower house, c.1600, comprising three-bay two-storey range with single-bay two-storey projecting bay to front (south-east) on an L-shaped plan having two-bay single-storey bay with half-dormer attic at angles to north-east, single-bay two-storey side elevation to north-east continuing into single-bay three-stage/storey medieval tower house to north-west on a square plan with single-bay two-storey flanking bay to rear elevation to west having single-bay single-storey projecting bay to north-west. Hipped and gable-ended roofs with slate (behind battlemented parapet to tower). Clay ridge tiles. Rendered and roughcast chimney stacks. Square rooflights. Rendered coping to gables. Cast-iron rainwater goods. Roughcast walls over rubble stone construction. Painted. Part slate-hung to tower. Roughcast battlemented parapet wall to tower with cut-stone coping. Square-headed openings (some pointed-arch openings to tower with quatrefoil opening to top floor to tower to north-west). Stone sills. 3/6, 6/6 and 8/8 timber sash windows with 2/2 sidelights to one tripartite window opening. Replacement glazed timber panelled door, c.1980. Interior with timber panelled shutters to window openings. Set back from road in grounds shared with Saint John’s Church with part of south-west elevation forming boundary wall fronting on to lane to south-west. Detached two-bay double-height outbuilding, c.1730, to south-east with elliptical-headed integral carriageway. Reroofed, c.1940. Gable-ended roof. Replacement corrugated-iron, c.1940. Iron ridge tiles. Cast-iron rainwater goods. Roughcast walls. Painted. Square-headed door opening. Timber panelled door. Elliptical-headed integral carriageway. Timber double doors with timber overpanel. Section of stone cobbling, c.1730, to site.

Appraisal

Saint David's Castle is an attractive house that is a little-known feature of the architectural heritage of Naas, being set well back from the line of Main Street and screened from view from Church Lane. The house is of considerable social and historical interest as one of the earliest and longest-standing private residences in the locality – the tower house dates to a period pre-1700 and is therefore of archaeological significance. Renovated and extended in the early eighteenth century to present the appearance of a gentleman’s residence, the house retains many of the features and materials dating from this phase of work. The house retains multi-pane timber sash fenestration of various dimensions, with some openings of other profiles, while the interior retains features such as timber panelled shutters to the window openings. A slate roof remains intact, having cast-iron rainwater goods, and the early aspect of the house is marred only by the insertion of an unsympathetic replacement door. The house is attractively set in grounds shared with Saint David’s Church (11814125/KD-19-14-125) as is accompanied by an outbuilding of much character, while being fronted by a section of stone cobbling that is evidence of a now almost-lost traditional practise.