Full Report for Listed Buildings
The list description is not intended to be a complete inventory of what is listed: it is principally intended to aid identification. By law, the definition of a listed building includes the entire building (i) and any structure or object that is fixed to the said building and ancillary to it and (ii) any other structure or object that forms part of the land and has done so since before 1 July 1948, and was within the curtilage of the building, and ancillary to it, on the date on which said building was first included in the list, or on 1 January 1969, whichever was later.
Date of Designation
21/08/1998
Date of Amendment
21/08/1998
Name of Property
Church of St Michael
Location
Stands above the SE bank of Llangorse Lake and just below the main road between Bwlch and Llangors in a steeply sloping churchyard bordered to E by a stone wall with railings and gatepiers.
Broad Class
Religious, Ritual and Funerary
History
All early maps show a church here including Map of Llangorse Lake of 1584 and Jones History of Brecknockshire provides some details, but the chancel and large N tower were built in 1868 by E H Martineau and the nave rebuilt 1894, so only earlier monuments in churchyard and just possibly the batter of W wall indicate a pre-Victorian origin. Connections with nearby Treholford, home of part of the Gwynne Holford family who also owned the Buckland Estate nearby at Talybont, also a large area of land round the S part of Llangorse Lake including Ty Mawr; the Estate was sold 1919.
Exterior
Small church, with large N tower, in Early Gothic Revival style. Of coursed or snecked rockfaced sandstone with ashlar dressings; part Welsh slate part tile roof with cruciform ashlar apex finials and decorative ridge tiles. Plan of nave, S porch, smaller lower chancel, large N tower attached at junction of nave and chancel. Tower has tall pyramidal roof of fishscale slates; ringing chamber has large paired pointed lights with heavy slate louvres under a relieving arch with cruciform vent; below is an offset ashlar string course; 2 small lancets to faces of tower chamber; at NW a 5-sided staircase turret with lancets and lead pyramidal roof, weathercoursing possibly to former chapel roof with fragmentary wall below; ground floor has large shouldered doorway in E wall under a pointed relieving arch, small W doorway; battered plinth with ashlar offset. Chancel has large ashlar kneelers and eaves course and large roughly dressed quoins; very steep pitched roof of small tiles; E window of 3 lights with Decorated tracery; lancets to N and S. Nave has slate roof, deep buttresses at E end with deep stepped offset; lancet windows; tall chimney at NE. Porch has heavy ashlar coping ending in decorative kneelers; chamfered pointed arched S door with block labels to hoodmould; inner door pointed arched doorway with rockfaced voussoirs; black and red quarry tile floor.
Interior
Interior nave is plain; C13 font is a plain bowl on a low stem and has an old cover; some monuments from former church re-erected. Chancel arch is of 2 orders with foliage stops, the piers dying back into the wall. Chancel roof of 3 bays is arch-braced supported on large corbels; stained glass E window to Gwynne Holford d Buckland 1859, important local landowning family; SE window by Mayer of Munich; 4 centred arched door to tower NE.
Reason for designation
Listed as a strikingly sited C19 church having historical associations with the area.
Cadw : Full Report for Listed Buildings [ Records 1 of 1 ]