Survey Data

Reg No

22206025


Rating

National


Categories of Special Interest

Archaeological, Architectural, Artistic, Historical, Technical


Original Use

Country house


Date

1650 - 1815


Coordinates

198006, 137198


Date Recorded

06/05/2005


Date Updated

--/--/--


Description

Detached multiple-bay two-storey country house, incorporating seventeenth-century house, enlarged 1812, now in ruins. Comprising central block with office wing to west having square and polygonal towers to front elevation and incorporating an earlier seventeenth-century house. Courtyard with outbuildings to north. Crenellations with machicolations to roofline. Lined-and-ruled render over brick walls with rendered string course to office wing. Ashlar limestone masonry plinths to towers. Projecting entrance bay, in ruins. Square-headed window openings with carved limestone label mouldings having ornate label stops to front. Pointed arch window openings to office wing. Two-storey gate lodge to east having crenellations with machicolations. Rendered brick walls with blank cross-loops to first floor and buttresses to ground floor. Square-headed opening with render hood moulding over pointed arch entrance. Three-stage polygonal tower to east elevation with crenellations and arrow slit windows with hood-mouldings. Coursed rubble limestone walled gardens to north.

Appraisal

This former country house was built by the Matthew family, the earliest house on this site, built by George Matthew dating to c. 1670. The house in its present form was enlarged in the Gothic style by Francis Matthew, II Earl of Llandaff in 1812. Richard Morrison designed the house incorporating a veneer of Gothic openings including the ornate polygonal and square towers to front elevation. The office wing to the right was also enlarged in the Gothic style. From 1870 the house fell into disrepair to become the impressive and spectacular ruin it is today. Much of the original seventeenth-century house survives in the interior of the building. The arched gate lodge to the east mirrors the architecture of the main house and retains many fine details such as the cross loops and hood mouldings. The walled gardens provide an example of the many demesne related activities thereby contributing context to the site.