17430

 

II  

Designated  

18/10/1996  

18/10/1996  

Parish Church of St Michael  

 

Ceredigion  

Llanfihangel Ystrad  

Lampeter  

Ystrad Aeron  

252444  

256221  

 

In centre of small village on W side of A482, within large graveyard.  

Religious, Ritual and Funerary  

 

Large parish church, rebuilt 1877-8 by John Middleton architect of Cheltenham. The aisle and nave, however, retain much masonry of the medieval church, which was double-naved in plan (characteristic of Cardiganshire and Carmarthenshire), this plan is reflected in the rebuilding. The work cost £1300, subcribers included the Vaughan families of Green Grove and Brynog.  

Geometric Gothic style. Nave with N aisle including organ chamber, chancel with N vestry, S porch with bellcote. Rubble construction with areas of medieval masonry. Bathstone dressings, including doorways and window tracery. Steeply-pitched slate roofs, overhanging eaves. Gables with cemented coping, carved crucifix finials to nave and chancel. Low two-step angle buttresses, single buttresses between nave/aisle, aisle/vestry and also between chancel S windows. S side with porch to left, surmounted by gabled bellcote (bell dated 1748). Pointed moulded doorway with hood, 2-light cusped side windows with segmental heads. Three pointed 2-light cusped nave windows with large cinqfoiled circles above. Chancel with 3 trefoiled lancets. Chancel E window of three cusped lights, major sexfoil and minor trefoils. Hood with carved head-stops. Trefoiled gable roundel. Lancet to chancel N as S. Gabled E end of vestry set back with window as nave S. Pointed N door, boarded door with iron strap-hinges. Aisle with 4 pairs of trefoiled lancets. Aisle W window as nave S. Nave W window of 4 trefoiled lights, sexfoils and apex cinqfoil. Hood with carved stops.  

Exposed stone walls, painted Bathstone details. Four-bay arcade, double-chamfered arches on round piers with simple caps. Tall moulded chancel arch on triple shafts with carved floral capitals. Hood with King/Queen headstops. Ribbed/boarded chancel roof, moulded wallplate. Arch-braced nave roof, alternate principals on moulded stone corbels. Angled struts above collars. Scissor-truss aisle roof. Good C12 font, square bowl with scalloped underside, circular pedestal and square base. C19 wooden lid with iron/brass strapwork. Triple-gabled carved stone reredos of the late C19, cusped arches on coloured marble colonettes. Simple inlaid/painted work to panels. Pews, stalls and timber pulpit all of 1878. Encaustic chancel tiles. Good stained W window of 1877 (Sermon on the Mount), E window, Resurrection, c.1880. Nave centre window of 1915, Nativity. Monuments: Stone tablet in chancel to Dorothy, Viscountess Lisburne (d1791), painted lettering and crest. Simple mid C19 tablets. Nave with good tablet to John Vaughan (d1855), sarcophagus and military emblems, signed by S.Manning of London. C20 tablets. C20 memorials in aisle, also slate tablet to Jenkin Jenkins (d1833) above organ arch; incised tooling. Large detached stoup-bowl in porch, presumably of the medieval church.  

Listed as a well-designed late C19 parish church, surprisingly large for rural Cardiganshire, which retains medieval masonry and unusual emphasis on reproducing idea of aisled plan of old church.