PGW(Gm)57(SWA)

Stouthall  

II  

01/02/2022  

Designated  

Swansea  

Reynoldston  

247533  

189373  

Gardens, Parks and Urban Spaces  

Small landscape park; wooded pleasure grounds with cave; walled kitchen garden  

1787-90; 1843-1903  

Registered for the historic interest of its small park and wooded pleasure grounds associated with the late Georgian villa residence. The grounds include an unusual sunken area of exposed stone, incorporated into the grounds with paths and planting; a natural cave that was ornamented as a garden feature; and an unusually well preserved ice-house. The house at Stouthall (LB: 19870) and the ice-house (LB: 22850) are also listed buildings. Stouthall was built for John Lucas the younger (1759-1831) by the Swansea architect William Jernegan in 1787-90. It replaced an earlier house, which stood to the south-west of the present house, in which members of the Lucas family had lived since at least the sixteenth-century. The small park at Stouthall lies to the west, north and northeast of the house. Few trees remain in the park, except for some perimeter planting. The extent of the park is surveyed on the first-edition Ordnance Survey map (1884) when it was planted with individual parkland trees and clumps. The park is probably contemporary with the house, dating from the 1790s. The pleasure grounds lie to the south and east of the house, bounded on the south by the A4118 road, on the west and north by field and park fencing and on the east by the Reynoldston road and property boundaries. The main entrance, off the A4118, is flanked by curving rubble stone walls and low, square piers of rusticated stone with dressed stone corners. The drive runs northwards, flanked by the wooded grounds and with an open lawn in front of the house. The drive runs past the service court to a small forecourt on the north front of the house. A secondary drive approaches from the north-east off the Reynoldston lane. To the east of the drive the grounds are wooded. They can be loosely divided into two parts: the southern end, to the south of the walled kitchen garden, and the northern part, to its west. The southern part has informal grass walks cut through it. Ornamental tree planting in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries appears to have been largely of beech but there are not many mature trees left, except for a few beech trees and a large pine near the boundary. To the south of the main east-west walk, is a large conglomerate standing stone, c.2.5 m high. This was probably placed here by Colonel Wood (who became owner of Stouthall in 1861) as a 'folly'. At the northern end, near the south wall of the kitchen garden, is a ruinous, overgrown oval structure bounded by stone walls up to 1m high. Its interior is lower than ground level, suggesting a pool. The west side is broken down, with a lot of fallen stone scattered on the ground, and to the west is an area of rockwork. The second area, to the west of the kitchen garden, is rather different in character, being a sunken area of natural rock, some probably quarried, some natural holes, cliffs and caves. The ground drops steeply from the drive and the first feature, on the western edge, is a very well preserved ice-house. Steep 'paths' hewn from the rock lead down from the ice-house to a cave. This has a tall narrow entrance with a rock arch over it, possibly contrived. Its top is now open, but it is said that it was once roofed over in stained glass. The rock area continues to the north, with overgrown paths leading to an 'amphitheatre' with rock faces around it; to an alcove cut out of the rock, through rocks to a sunken passageway to another 'amphitheatre' planted around with yews. The whole area is planted with yew trees, giving a slightly gloomy atmosphere, and the dampness and shade have encouraged ferns. Immediately west of the northern end of the kitchen garden is an area of large mature beech trees. The last remaining area of the pleasure grounds is that at the east end of the secondary drive. The area to the south of the drive is wooded, dominated by a group of large beeches. In them is a small pond, with a winding channel below it which peters out. The grounds were probably initially laid out for John Lucas the younger, at the same time as the house was built in 1787-90. Lucas is known to have been a keen botanist and is likely to have taken an interest in his grounds. The 1920 Sale Particulars mention pleasure grounds 'of limited extent and inexpensive to maintain'. They included a tennis lawn, Ladies' Garden and shrubberies. The tennis lawn was presumably to the south of the house, the Ladies' Garden adjacent to the house and the shrubberies to the east. The embellishment of the rocky area, including the cave, was probably undertaken by Colonel Wood and his wife Mary in the second half of the nineteenth-century. The walled kitchen garden lies to the east of the house, surrounded by the wooded pleasure grounds. It is a walled rectangular garden, elongated north-south and divided east-west into two unequal compartments, the northern one being smaller. The walled garden is probably contemporary with the house, dating to the early 1790s. In the 1870s orchards surrounded the garden on the north and east. The 1920 Sale Particulars mention a lean-to vinery 65ft long, in two divisions, a potting ground and an orchard adjoining. Significant View: From the north front of the house across the park and the Gower landscape. Sources: Cadw 2000: Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales, Glamorgan, 200-02 (ref: PGW(Gm)57(SWA)). Ordnance Survey first-edition six-inch map, sheet: Glamorgan XXXI (1877).