PGW(C)60(DEN)

Llantysilio Hall  

II  

01/02/2022  

Designated  

Denbighshire  

Llantysilio  

319200  

343563  

Gardens, Parks and Urban Spaces  

Park; informal garden; walled garden; avenue.  

Eighteenth century; 1870s.  

Llantysilio Hall is located to the north-west of Llangollen inside a bend in the river Dee in a very picturesque location. The registered grounds incorporate the fine axial arrangement of house, walled garden and avenue, dated to the eighteenth and nineteenth century. There is group value with the Grade II* Listed Llantysilio Hall, its Grade II Listed lodge (LB 1320), and the Grade II Listed walled garden with its sundial (LBs 1321-2). The Hall dates from the late nineteenth century and replaced an earlier, eighteenth-century, house. The house is approached from the north-east from an entrance and lodge off a minor road, along a curving drive to a forecourt and garden on the east front. The lodge was probably built at the same time as Llantysilio Hall, 1872-74. A small area around the house and garden has been landscaped with tree planting. The earliest part is the lime avenue running south from the centre of the walled garden downslope to the river. This is probably early eighteenth-century in date (with some replacement trees) contemporary with the original house. The back drive, from the road to the walled garden, may have been the original drive and is partially flanked by limes. The fields east and south-east of the walled garden are planted with a few isolated specimen conifers, probably in the late nineteenth century. There are belts of planted woodland north-west of the house and south of the lodge. The garden is laid out to the east, west and south of the house. To the east and west the ground is level, to the south it drops steeply down to the walled garden. This part of the garden is contemporary with the house, c. 1872-74, although some of the trees may be older. In front of the house, to its east, is a rectangular forecourt bounded on the north and east by a shrub border with a few ornamental trees. A gravel path around the house leads to the west garden which is a rectangular lawn bounded by a bank of rhododendrons on the north and by a shrub and woodland area to the west. To the south of the house is a steeply-sloping lawn, levelling out on the site of the former house, and bounded on the south by a revetment wall with central steps down to the back drive. At the west end a small stone pavilion is built into the wall. Informal groups of deciduous trees with shrub underplanting lie either side of the lawn. At the west end of the foot of the slope an overgrown paved area and small pool are perhaps the remains of a former L-shaped conservatory. The walled garden lies to the south of the house, below the grass slope, in the middle of the north-south axis with the house and avenue. It was built as an adjunct to the earlier house and later incorporated into the nineteenth-century garden. It is square and surrounded on all sides but the south with composite walls of stone, lined internally with brick, about 3.5m high. The south side is bounded by an iron fence, ditch, and revetment wall topped by a box hedge. The entrance is in the middle of the north side, with a gate and steps down to a central gravel path flanked, half way down the garden, by two large yew hedges; the rest of the garden is rough or mown grass, with old espalier apple trees lining the paths; further paths run along the north, east and west sides. Still surviving are some old pear and plum trees lining the walls, an old mulberry tree, and a large bay tree. In the south-west corner is a small brick pavilion, a lean-to glasshouse against the west end of the north wall, some glasshouse footings outside of it, and a potting shed in the north-west corner. There is a small rectangular pond in the middle of the north-south central axis. Setting - Llantysilio Hall is located in the beautiful setting of the picturesque Dee valley. Significant views - The Hall is deliberately sited to give fine views across the valley. It was built so that its south front is aligned on the walled garden and the avenue to the south. Sources: Cadw 1995: Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales, Clwyd, 164-6 (ref: PGW(C)60(DEN)). Ordnance Survey 25-inch map, sheet: Denbighshire XXXIV.10 (second edition, 1895).