Ffordd Las Fawr including attached byre and cattle ramp at downhill end

Cadw's description

Location

Approximately 1.8km NW of Partrishow church and in a clearing in a forestry plantation. The house is reached by footpaths and has a barn opposite.

History

C17 farmhouse, to which the present byre incorporating an outside cross passage was later added, probably replacing an earlier byre. The house was remodelled by 1841 with a new front facing away from the farm yard and with a new wing on the N side facing the yard.

Exterior

Consisting of a main range facing S with lower byre on E side which has lean-to bakehouse to S, ruined stable on W side, and a parallel gabled wing on the N side. Built on a sloping site with a broad cattle ramp around the byre, which has a rubble-stone revetment on the NE side. Random rubble with slate roofs (byre with recent corrugated steel roof). The main range has battered walls and its slate roof is lately renewed. Large stone stack on E side is C19 rebuild, smaller stone stack to W added C19.

On S side is a 2-window front with openings offset to L, consisting of C19 2-light casements in the upper storey and horned sashes in the lower storey (under concrete lintel to L). The byre to R is set back slightly and has a wide boarded door to cross passage under a late C19 lean-to canopy with a brick pier and slate roof. To R of the canopy is an added single-storey lean-to former bakehouse with a stone stack to R. The L side wall facing the cross-passage doorway has a boarded door to R and an inserted casement window above. In the S wall is a window (now boarded up) under drip stone. The E gable end has an inserted doorway to centre now boarded up, and an inserted window above. On the N side, facing the yard, is a boarded cross-passage door to R under a lean-to canopy, L of which are 3 byre doorways (under renewed lintels centre and L), with boarded stable doors with strap hinges.

The N wing has, in the E gable end, a wide boarded door to L. The 2-window N front has 2-light casements under segmental heads in the upper storey, boarded up under similar heads in the lower storey. In the W gable end is an external stack with tall flue. In the N wall of the main house, part obscured by the wing, is a window to the original service room renewed under a drip stone.

The W gable end of the house is cement-rendered, and has a single-storey stable projection now roofless. On N side facing the yard the stable has a doorway to L, and the gable end has a loft opening with a drip stone.

Interior

Not inspected at the time of survey (November 1997) but the cross passage is said to be divided from byre by a post-and-panel partition, while the house is said to retain ornate door heads.

Reason for designation

A good example of a sub-medieval Breconshire farmhouse improved in the C19.