Y Rheithordy

Cadw's description

Location

Located opposite the church, the driveway reached off a lane leading S from the main road. Set in grounds, with outbuildings to the SW and E.

History

Built in the late C18-early C19. The entrance and principal rooms on the N side were added to an earlier house, which was remodelled as service rooms. Bay windows were added to the N front in the late C19, re-using the sills of the earlier windows. In the mid-C20 the house was divided into 2 apartments, and at the end of the C20, windows and the roof were renewed.

An earlier rectory on the site was the birthplace of Richard Wilson (1713-82), the foremost landscape painter of Wales in the C18. His father, John Wilson of Trefeglwys, was Rector of Penegoes, but Richard, the 3rd son, spent much of his youth at Leeswood Hall in Mold, the family home of his mother, Alice Wynne. It was his grandfather, Sir George Wynne, who helped him train as a portrait painter in London. Wilson gradually turned to landscape painting, spending his foremost years in Rome, returning to London in 1757 where he was a founder member of the Royal Academy, and its librarian from 1776. He retired to Mold, where he later died.

Exterior

A square late Georgian house of 2 storeys-and-attics, of large blocks of coursed rubble stone under a shallow hipped slate roof; renewed blue-brick ridge stack (another probably missing), and wide boarded eaves. The principal elevations, entrance front to W and garden front to N, have a moulded stone eaves cornice. Windows are horned sashes, mainly under slate lintels. The entrance front has an added round-headed porch with lattice-work sides; it contains double wooden panelled doors under a fan-light with iron radial glazing bars. To its L is a replacement 16-pane window, and to the upper storey above the porch, a 12-pane window under a slate lintel. On the R-hand side of the porch, the elevation is set back and is part of the earlier, S part of the house. It has no eaves cornice, a 12-pane sash to lower L, and 2 similar windows lighting the upper storey.

The 2-window garden front to N has added bay windows to the lower storey, pebble-dashed under hipped swept roofs. They have tripartite small-pane sashes. The upper storey has 6-pane windows under polished slate lintels. The earlier S elevation is of random rubble stone. It has a tall blocked window to L of centre under a depressed arch of slate voussoirs. Twelve-pane sashes to L and R, not aligned with upper storey windows, and a blocked doorway to far R. The 1st floor and attic are 2-window with 12-pane sashes, those to attic under gabled half dormers. The E side is pebble-dashed, with a large outshut on the L side which incorporates an earlier single-storey range. To the centre is a mid-C20 flat-roofed porch with part-lit boarded door (this is the entrance to the upper apartment), above which is a small-pane stair-light. The outshut has sash windows and C20 top-hung windows; the earlier range has a doorway to S gable end, the infill to its L including late C20 French doors.

Interior

The entrance hall leads to the principal rooms on the L side, which have panelled window reveals. Interior detail is otherwise altered.

Reason for designation

Listed for its special architectural interest as a late Georgian Rectory, retaining definite C18 and C19 character. It also marks the site of the birthplace of the painter Richard Wilson.