Cemetery House, including stable in yard

Cadw's description

Location

On the NE side of the main entrance to Cathays Cemetery and set back from Fairoak Road behind the main perimeter wall.

History

Cardiff New Cemetery was opened in 1859. Cemetery House was a lodge at the main entrance, close to the Anglican and non-conformist chapels, and was probably designed by R.G. Thomas, architect of Newport, who designed the chapels.

Exterior

Gothic style 1½ storey lodge of snecked, rock-faced sandstone with lighter freestone dressings, banded slate roof with overhanging eaves, bracketed and with barge boards to the gables. On the S side are 2 rendered brick stacks, while the N gable end has a brick and stone stack. The asymmetrical double-fronted E entrance faces Fairoak Road and is partly concealed behind the heightened perimeter wall of the cemetery. It has a central boarded door under a pointed overlight and hood mould with foliage stops. Above the doorway is a raked 2-light dormer. To the L of the doorway is an advanced gabled bay. It has a canted bay window with hipped stone slab roof, and mullions with shafts and foliage capitals, cornice with foliage stops, and 2-pane sash windows. The gable is half hipped. The attic has a 2-light window with cusped-headed lights incorporating casements, a central shafted mullion, and sill with foliage stops, all beneath a pointed relieving arch with small trefoil. To the R of the doorway is a 2-light canted bay window battered below the sill, with 2-pane sash window under a hipped slate roof. The 2-light attic window has cusped-headed lights incorporating 2-pane sashes, below a relieving arch with small pointed trefoil and beneath a gablet.

The S side wall faces the cemetery entrance. It has an L-shaped lean-to porch comprising an arcade of cusped arches (originally open but now glazed) on a dwarf wall, with cusped wooden arch to the L. Inside the porch is a pointed window facing the entrance and on its R a boarded storm door with strap hinges. The door to the house is panelled. On the R side of the porch is a cusped lancet window, while a small trefoil attic window is upper L over the porch.

On the L side of the porch is the gable end of a projecting rear wing, which has barge boards and eaves brackets similar to the front. A canted bay window is battered below sill level and hipped slab roof over a cornice with foliage stops. The central 2-pane sash window is beneath a shouldered lintel while the side lights have cusped heads. A 2-light attic window with cusped headed lights and relieving arch is similar to the E front. Set back on the L side is a rear outshut, its S wall having a 4-pane sash window in a dressed surround and relieving arch. An inserted window is in the rear wall, and a rear porch is on its N side.

The rear wall of the main range, to the L of the rear wing, has a single-storey lean-to with casement window in a dressed surround, on the R side of which is a shallow projection, the roof of which is concealed behind a parapet. It has a cusped light in its N wall and a dressed surround to a casement window in the lower storey facing the rear. The N gable end of the rear wing has a large 4-pane sash window in the lower storey and a 2-light window with cusped heads in the upper storey, both with relieving arches similar to the front. The N gable end of the main range has 2 attic sashes.

On the N side of the house is a stable of snecked rock-faced stone and lighter freestone dressings, and slate roof with overhanging eaves, and yellow brick ridge stack L of centre. Facing the yard to the S are central full-height double doors with strap hinges, beneath a gablet incorporating an overlight. On the L side is a doorway with double diagonal-boarded doors with strap hinges. On the R side is a 2-light mullioned window. The L (W) gable end has 2 openings with shouldered lintels, and pointed quatrefoil to the apex.

Reason for designation

Listed as a well-detailed mid C19 Gothic lodge, and for group value with the gateway and mortuary chapels at the finest public cemetery in Wales.