18728

 

II  

Designated  

07/08/1997  

07/08/1997  

Ty-mawr Farmhouse  

 

Torfaen  

New Inn  

Pontypool  

Llanvihangel Pontymoel  

331158  

201585  

E  

To the east of the railway line reached by a lane off the Usk Road.  

Domestic  

 

Two interpretations of this house are possible. One is that the building was of two dates with the one-and-a-half storey section built first, probably round about 1600, and the taller section added to it quite soon afterwards, maybe in c1625 (Fox and Raglan). Alternatively the whole thing was built together as parlour wing and service wing, again dating from the early C17. The first interpretation is perhaps more likely, but the second is not impossible. Since that date the principal alteration has been the removal of all the main original windows and their replacement by Victorian sashes and casements. Some of the rooms have been partitioned in the C20, the interior is otherwise remarkably unchanged. A similar type of house, but rather grander, is illustrated in Peter Smith, Houses of the Welsh Countryside, p.187, and this gives some idea of what Ty-mawr may have looked like in the C17. The farm was purchased by the Pontypool Park estate from the trustees of the Duke of Beaufort in 1759.  

Plastered and painted over thinly coursed rubblestone which is visible in places. This is mostly pennant type limestone, with infill in red sandstone. Stone tile roofs which have been replaced recently. In two sections of different build, two storeys and attic, and one-and-a-half storeys. Main block : The entrance front is almost blind with very small windows and covered mostly by the projecting wing which contains a lateral stack and the staircase. This has a small casement window with dripmould over which lights the stairs. To the right of this is a pent roof to the porch, which contains a late C16 or early C17 nailed plank door with moulded cranked head, and timber frame with broach stops to the jambs, in the baffle entry position against the stack. This may have been the original front door if the lower part of the house was built first. It would have stood at right angles to where it stands now for the end entry against the stack. Above the pent roof is a small 4+4 casement. Ridge stack to the right and an end stack on the wing, both of which are rebuilt in C19 red brick with weathered caps. The gable ends only have small garret windows. The garden elevation has two windows on each floor, small paned casements below, six over six sashes above, all under timber lintels, with strainer arches above. These replace the original mullioned windows the outlines of which can be traced faintly in the walling, and recognised by the infill of red sandstone. They were considerably wider than the present windows and probably had four lights with recessed chamfers to the frames. Kitchen wing : This is one and-a-half storeys and has two small paned casements and one gabled dormer with small paned casement facing the yard; and two 3 light small paned casements with wooden mullions facing the garden. Small rebuilt red brick chimney stack on gable end.  

The house is in two very distinct halves which may have been built together or separately, but are, in any case very close in date. Parlour wing : The main door enters a passage which gives onto the staircase, a living room and an unheated service room, as well as the entry into the service wing to the right. The ground floor living room has a fireplace with oak lintel and stone jambs. The room is plastered, except the back of the oak screen which is covered in plasterboard. Limeash floor. The service room unusually has an L-shaped oak post-and panel screen. Both rooms have chamfered ceiling beams with bar and scroll stops. The staircase, which is a dog-leg, runs beside the stack, but the lower flights have all been replaced in recent years. The upper floor has two rooms, a small bathroom and a corridor. The doorway into the upper floor of the kitchen wing has a shaped head and probably comes from the position at the head of the stairs where the mortices in the ceiling beam reveal where a screen once was. The bedroooms have Victorian fireplaces. There is a suggestion that this floor may have been a 'Great Chamber' in the Elizabethan mould; both floors of this block have notably high ceilings. The stair rises to the attic, which is plastered but unceiled. The roof has principal rafter trusses with ties and collars, two tiers of through purlins, and with the principals halved and pegged at the apex and carrying a diagonal ridge piece. The rafters are new and the roofs felted. There is also what appears to be an upper cruck blade which was presumably reused from another building. The service wing has a corridor leading to the modern kitchen, and the main room is divided into sitting room and parlour by a modern partition; chamfered ceiling beams with run-out stops. The old fireplace is hidden, the position of the fireplace stair is still evident. The upper floor has a principal rafter roof. This floor was originally reached by its own stair but is now entered from the upper corridor through a botched doorway as described above. This need not necessarily be seen as evidence of the two parts of the building having been built at different times.  

This is a very interesting farmhouse demonstrating an increase in status in the C17 and with good surviving features.