History

First recorded house on site was a Jacobean mansion c 1600; connections with the Jones and Games families. Buckland was conveyed to the Gwynne family in 1756, the family according to Theophilus Jones being one of the oldest in Wales 'connected by blood or marriage..with nearly all other native houses of ancient lineage' and playing a major role in public affairs over many centuries. House built for Roderick Gwynne c 1775 and had a 3 storey NE front with a colonnade and pediment and wings; NW front had Ionic pilasters on a basement supporting a balustrade and pediments on the wings. In the early C19 there being no male descendants the property passed to a daughter who married James Price Holford of Cilgwyn Carmarthenshire d 1846, the origin of the Gwynne Holford family who remained owners until the estate was sold. House remodelled by Major Gwynne Holford 1836-40. Destroyed by fire and rebuilt in 1898 by SW Williams, architect of Rhayader. Much of the Estate sold c1920 though Buckland House and park retained as a sporting estate until 1935. Institutional use from the Second World War until returned to private ownership.

Exterior

Large country house in Elizabethan Revival style. Built of snecked rock-faced stone with red sandstone dressings; Welsh slate roof with corniced ridge stacks and terracotta pots; decorative kneelers and ball finials to each gable. Windows are mostly cross-framed horned sashes with moulded mullions and continuous hoodmoulds and sillbands. E-shaped park frontage, with three gabled projecting wings, the centre narrower. Three storeys, the outer wings have 2,3 and 4 light windows to the three floors respectively; centre bay has 4 light first floor window and stretching across the ground floor of this and the two recessed narrow bays is an added wide stone verandah, the flat roof supported by clustered stone columns, with central carved stone crest and strapwork mouldings to frieze and plinth; 5 light ground floor bay window has 2 side doors giving access. Entrance elevation left has an embattled porte cochere with moulded pointed archways to each side, deep clasping buttresses with offsets at the corners, the parapet incorporating blank crest panels and finials; porch bay behind has black and white marble floor, Tudor-arched main entrance doorway with side lights and overlight and double door with linenfold panelling; large ground floor bay projects to left with embattled parapet; full dormers to second floor. Garden frontage has similar ground floor bay with embattled parapet left and deep central cross wing with 2-storey bay. Lower service wings, some with hipped roofs, gablets, rooflights, extend to right, with an added opposite wing forming a deep courtyard to rear.

Interior

Plan of very large main central hall with staircase and side wings housing a series of large rooms, former drawing room and dining room to right and library and former billiard room later converted to dining room to left; main entrance to all rooms from entrance hall left. Billiard room has low Tudor-arched stone fireplace, dark oak panelled walls with decorative carved rails and cornice, and panelled ceiling with bosses. Library has fitted shelving with strapwork motif and grey marble fireplace with large carved wooden Elizabethan style chimneypiece incorporating caryatids and other figures; 6 panelled doors. Main hall has large impressive imperial staircase with heavily moulded balusters, moulded ramped handrail decorated with deep finials, arcade to gallery landing with pierced tracery and wide balustrade to staircase well; large staircase cross-framed window with stained glass. Hall has a stone fireplace to each side wall with chimneybreasts carved with strapwork motif and coats of arms of the Gwynne Holford family; room is panelled and has very decorative glazed doorways to wings: that to left has Elizabethan motifs, that to right has a side segmental arched overlight with radial glazing bars; panelled plaster ceiling; landing supported by wide fluted rectangular piers. Reception rooms to right have had fireplaces removed but former dining room retains ceiling with moulded plaster panels, egg and dart moulding; panelled reveals to bays. Former kitchen has rooflight; belltower above.

Reasons for Listing

Listed as the principal building of an important estate and landscape park in this area.

Group value with other listed buildings at Buckland

External Links

• Cadwr Listing
• Wikidata Q29498522

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, and Peterborough (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  [(Bedfordshire, Huntingdon and Peterborough)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1968)
• 
  Northamptonshire: Buildings of England Series (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Historic Environment Law: Planning, Listed Buildings, Monuments, Conservation Areas and Objects by Harwood, Richard (2012) Paperback
• 
  Oxfordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Harrow on the Hill: A photographic portrayal of listed buildings and structures (Historic Buildings Picture Guides)