Steps up to Penlan, with flanking walls

Cadw's description

Location

On the E side of Bull Street in the village of Maentwrog S of the War Memorial

History

Early-mid C19. The line of the steps is indicated on the tithe map of the parish, 1840, built on part of Tir y Llan, owned by Louisa J Oakeley of Plas Tan-y-bwlch and occupied by Cadwaladr Evans. None of the houses at the top of the steps are shown, which suggests that they were either under construction, or being planned at the time of the survey.
William Gruffyd Oakeley (1790-1835) was only 21 when he inherited the Plas Tan-y-bwlch estate and set about an ambitious programme of improving the estate. This entailed new building in the village of Maentwrog and rebuilding or improving the existing buildings. In order to do so he opened a quarry near Gelli Grin from which was quarried the large lengths of brown stone present in so many of the village buildings; the steps and the dividing wall appear to have been constructed of this stonework.

Exterior

Long flight of steps leading up the hillside to the E side of Bull Street. The steps are flanked by rubble walling with flat stone slab coping. The central dividing wall is of coursed blockwork with a shaped, raking coping with rounded central ridge and square newels at the angles with stepped and pyramidal caps. The steps themselves are formed from large blocks of stone, possibly from the quarry close to Gelli Grin. At the left side of the steps is a flat-headed archway into the grounds of Penlan. Built of roughly coursed masonry and with slate slab drip course and coping to an embattled parapet.
The left hand flight led up to the house at Penlan and the right hand flight up to the servant's quarters (now called Bryn or Penlan flats); the quality of the stonework and the width of the steps clearly reflects the status of the users, the left hand flight being of considerably finer construction.

Reason for designation

Included as a little altered early C19 flight of steps that forms an integral component of the group of houses set above Bull Street and a group with the other buildings at the centre of the estate village at Maentwrog.