18464

 

II  

Designated  

29/05/1997  

29/05/1997  

Church Farm  

 

Torfaen  

Trevethin  

Pontypool  

Trevethin  

328829  

202172  

 

To the north east of St. Cadoc's and the east of Mount Road on the edge of open countryside; an old farmhouse with an urban setting on one side and an extremely rural one on the other.  

Domestic  

 

The older section of the house would appear to be of the late C16 or early C17, the front range with lobby entry (now blocked) and containing hall/kitchen and dairy, the rear wing containing family rooms and with an additional floor. Added to this in probably the mid C17 is another smaller house which has been amalgamated with the rest probably in the C20, and now contains the main entrance to the whole.  

A two phase farmhouse which was originally probably two houses, now amalgamated as one. The original house is an L-shaped block of front range with a projecting rear wing; this is probably of one build. To the right of the front range is an additional range added perhaps fifty years later. This has its own entrance, now the entrance to the whole, and was probably a separate house until the C20. The whole structure is one and a half storeys (except for the two storey and attic rear wing) of plastered and whitewashed rubble with a concrete tile roof replicating stone slates. It is evident from the weathering on three of the chimneys that the roof was once thatched. The fourth chimney without weathering has been rebuilt in recent years.The front elevation has on the left the older section with a two and a three light casement and an eaves dormer above. The eaves project, originally forming a pentice, now a scarce feature, but once characteristic of houses in Monmouthshire and Breconshire. To the right in the woodshed is the original front doorway now blocked. This would have led to a lobby entry. The shed is roofed with a lean-to which also covers the porch of the present main door in the right section, once the entry to a separate house. This section has a small two light casement and a gabled dormer above, also a modern rooflight. Two ridge chimneys on the older roof, the left hand one is smaller suggesting that it heated only the upper room. The later section has a recently rebuilt chimney on the right hand end of the ridge. All external joinery features are C20, as they are on the other elevations, although some of the openings are unaltered. The rear elevation windows are of different sizes, a larger one at the rear of the hall, a smaller one with dripmould to the old dairy and another lighting the upper room in the gable. There are also modern rooflights in several of the roof slopes. The projecting rear wing has an old chimney at the gable end, and a small single storey lean-to.  

The interior is quite complicated for while much is visible other features have been changed or hidden by modernisation. The older section of the house is two cell on the ground floor but is now one room as the plank and muntin screen was removed in recent years. The original front door is blocked, the main fireplace reconstructed, and what was evidently the unheated dairy now incorporated in the main living room. The beamed ceiling has lambs tongue stops to the chamfers. The staircase to the upper floor rises at the left of the main stack and forks at the half landing into the rear wing as well. It is a stone winding stair and appears to have an original doorway with cranked head at the bottom. The upper floor of the front range has a three bay upper cruck roof halved and jointed at the apex, with chamfering on the principals and on the very large purlins. The rear wing has two full floors with lower ceiling heights and then an attic reached by a further winding stair round the end stack reaching a principal rafter roof halved and pegged at the apex and with three tiers of purlins. The later section of the house which is entered through the main front door is of one room with a beamed ceiling with lambs tongue stops to the chamfers, and an altered fireplace. The floor has been lowered about 30cm. The original stone stair leads round the stack to an upper room with an A-frame roof with nicely finished principals, collar beams and purlins. The apex is now ceiled.  

An extremely interesting farmhouse originating in about 1600 which retains an upper cruck roof, and with a major addition of about 1650.