13130

 

II*  

Designated  

16/12/1952  

03/09/2004  

Flemingston Court Farmhouse  

 

Vale of Glamorgan  

St. Athan  

Barry  

Flemingston  

301693  

170023  

 

On the south side of the Churchyard of the Church of St Michael the Archangel.  

Domestic  

 

A major early C16 house which has survived remarkably unaltered and is a great rarity in that it has kept almost all its original windows. The service arrangement was refurbished in the late C17 when the kitchen was brought into the house, and then again in the Victorian period, but the C20 has seen only the usual modernisation, although this has included the rebuilding of the east gable above the first floor and the west wall of the kitchen wing, including the insertion of two windows under the higher eaves.  

Built of local lias limestone rubble with ashlar dressings in Sutton stone or local sandstone, but the walls are entirely lime rendered and washed; Welsh slate roofs (the kitchen wing is known to have been thatched in the late C19). L-shaped plan with the main apartment wing running east-west, a service wing, though still with high status windows (though these are probably later insertions reusing redundant windows from the main block), running north from the west end, and a detached kitchen block (qv). The main south elevation is in four bays. From the left a 3-light stone mullioned window with sunk chamfers, 4-centred heads and a dripmould. This is the Inner Room/Parlour and it has a blind wall for the floor above. Next a smaller 3-light window with a higher cill, above two 2-light windows on either side of a wall stack, the left hand window with lower cill; these light the Great Room. Next comes the very large lateral stack for the Hall fireplace. Next the cross-passage entry with a pointed arch of two chamfered orders and a plain dripmould, C19 boarded double doors, above this a 2-light window. Lastly a small window/vent to an originally unlighted and unheated room, perhaps a strong-room, with above a 2-light window. The left gable has an external stack for the Inner Room/Parlour and the room above, the right gable has an inserted brick stack, and the upper part of the wall has been rebuilt. The north elevation of this wing has an inserted C20 2-light small-paned casement into the ground floor room with blind walling above. Next the cross-passage door as before with a 2-light window above. Then the 4-light mullion-and-transom Hall window, which has flat headed lights and may be a later insertion; with a C20 2-light casement above. The west end of this range is covered by the projecting north service wing which has two bays. The first has a C16 lean-to on the ground floor containing the corridor to the Hall and stair-foot. This has two 2-light windows at different levels, the right hand one is perhaps a C17 alteration, and a small 2-light window above. The north gable has an external stack added when the kitchen was moved indoors, perhaps at the end of the C17. The west side of this wing has two 6 over 6 pane sashes on either floor inserted with the C20 improvements; these are the only major changes to the early C16 fabric. The west gable end is mostly slate hung.  

The interior is also remarkably unaltered from its C16 planning. The Hall has a compartmented ceiling of six panels, with roll moulded beams and a fine C16 stone fireplace. It also has the highly unusual feature of paired corner doorways with sharply pointed heads sharing a single jamb. These lead to the Inner Room/Parlour and to the staircase. The Parlour has another 6-panel compartmented ceiling with roll moulded joists, and a reconstructed fireplace and was probably remodelled in the Georgian period as it has a 6-panel entrance door, with the thickness of the wall also panelled. The Kitchen in the rear wing has been remodelled c2000 from the previous Victorian kitchen, parts of which survive. The cross-passage, of which the west wall is said to be a later insertion, and the originally unheated eastern room were not seen at resurvey (December 2003). The stair is modern, but in the original compartment. Upstairs the Great Chamber, currently divided into three bedrooms, has more pointed stone doorways and some plain C18 and C19 joinery. It has a higher floor level than the rest of the rooms. The roof trusses were not seen but are known to be collar trusses, also C16, and the Great Room was originally open to the roof.  

Included and highly graded as an exceptionally fine early C16 gentry house which, unusually, retains almost all its C16 windows as well as other important contemporary and later features.