Maes-y-coed Farmhouse

Cadw's description

Location

Reached down a short farm road on the S side of the A541, just W of the junction of the A541 and B5122.

History

An early C17 house shown in its original form on the 1742 map of Maes Mynon demesne when it comprised a single N-S range. This survives but later in the C18 a new N front was added, in which form it is shown on the 1849 Tithe map. An integral part of this enlargement was the heightening of the original house. Subsequent additions included a lean-to dairy on the E side of the earlier house, and a granary on the W side of the C18 front (which also provided accommodation for farm workers), all of which is shown on the 1871 Ordnance Survey.

Maes-y-Coed was the birthplace of the clergyman and scholar John Wynne (1667-1743). He was Principal of Jesus College, Oxford, bishop of St Asaph and then Bath & Wells, and resided at Soughton Hall in Northop from 1732.

Exterior

The N-facing house comprises a symmetrical 5-bay C18 entrance range of 2 storeys with attic, with lower single-bay granary to the R side. Behind to the centre of the C18 range is the C17 house, which has lean-tos on both sides. The entrance range is whitened roughcast with slate roof behind coped gables and brick end stacks. It has a central doorway with moulded surround and a panelled reveal to a fielded-panel door and small-pane overlight. The near-flush windows are 12-pane hornless sashes. The lower granary to the R has a horned sash window in a gablet. The whitened rubble-stone rear wing has a massive external stone stack in its coped gable end with 3 brick flues. On the E side is a lean-to (originally a dairy) of rubble stone with bigger quoins and 2 inserted windows, while in its S end wall is a boarded door under a segmental head. On the W side of the rear wing is a late C19 margin-lit sash window lower R below a small-pane sash window in a brick surround to the upper storey. A lean-to in the angle of the main range has a window to the R with wooden louvres, and inserted window to the L, and is abutted by a wall concealing an oil tank. Its S wall has a boarded door under a segmental head. Above the lean-to the C17 house has a 2-light casement. The former granary attached to the entrance range has, in the S wall, external stone steps, which incorporate a kennel beneath them, to a boarded door beneath the eaves. Its W gable end has double boarded doors to the R under a segmental head, a single stable door to the L and a small loft window, all with keyed heads and voussoirs.

Interior

The rear wing retains doorways to the entrance range in the lower and upper storeys, both of which have 2 orders of ovolo moulding. Otherwise the main internal details are C18 and includes doors with 2 and 6 fielded panels. The C18 N range has cross beams with run-out stops. Two- and 6-panel doors are retained, some with wrought-iron hinges. The close-string stair is in the rear wing. A C17 open-well attic stair, partly dismantled, has ornate fret-cut balusters, and was possibly moved here when the original house was heightened and the original stair replaced. The roof has C18 collar-beam trusses.

Reason for designation

Listed grade II* as an especially fine and well-preserved C18 farmhouse with substantial earlier rear wing, which with the adjacent agricultural range comprises a complete farm group in a prominent location near the bottom of Caerwys Hill.