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| − | {{Infobox NT
| + | #Redirect[[Llanerchaeron]] |
| − | |name=Llanacheron
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| − | |county=Cardiganshire
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| − | |picture=Llanacheron.JPG
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| − | |picture caption=Llanacheron House and nearby church
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| − | |os grid ref=
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| − | |latitude=52.218333
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| − | |longitude=-4.224722
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| − | |type=Country house
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| − | |website={{NT link}}
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| − | }}
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| − | '''Llanerchaeron''', known as "Llanayron House" to its nineteenth-century occupants, is a Grade I listed mansion on the [[River Aeron]] in [[Cardiganshire]], designed and built in 1795<ref name=snhist/> by John Nash for Major (later Colonel) William Lewis as a model, self-sufficient farm complex. Its name appears in various forms: 'Llanayron' is Anglicised from the Welsh "Llannerch Aeron" as used in 19th-century public records. Many variant spellings of this place name have been used.
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| − | The house and estate are near [[Ciliau Aeron]], some two miles south-east of [[Aberaeron]] in Cardiganshire. There is evidence that the house replaced an earlier mansion. A later owner, William Lewes was the husband of Colonel Lewis's inheriting daughter.<ref>"John and Eliza were the children of William Lewis and Corbetta Williama Powell.
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| − | The estate passed to Eliza, who married William Lewes and it was their great grandson,
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| − | John Powell Ponsonby who left the estate to the National Trust in 1989".—From the Coflein 'Heritage assessment' available in Outside links below.</ref>
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| − | The estate is now in the care of the [[National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty|National Trust]]. The neighbouring parish church, St Non, was redesigned by Nash. It has registers of baptisms and burials dating from 1730 and marriages from 1754.<ref>Kelly's Directory, South Wales 1895, cited at [http://www.genuki.org.uk/big/wal/CGN/LlannerchAeron/Kellys1895.html GENUKI: Llannerch Aeron - Kelly's Directory 1895]</ref>
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| − | ==Service facilities==
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| − | [[File:LlaBrew2120.jpg|left|thumb|200px|Brewing room where various styles of beers were made and piped underground to the house]]
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| − | What gives Llanerchaeron its unique historical value is the fact that later owners allowed the farm and household service outbuildings to languish out of use, with no attempt to demolish or renovate them. As a result, we can clearly see exactly where and how essential tasks were performed with considerable attention to quality standards, and often aided by advanced technology, including electricity generated by a water-wheel.
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| − | The service facilities include a large laundry and linen-care room, spaces for brewing, butter and cheese making, preparation and salting or smoking of meat and fish, preservation of fruits and vegetables and a full range of crafts. The estate employed carpenters and a full-time stonemason who designed and built whole buildings as well as overseeing the construction of walls, drying platforms and other farm requisites.
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| − | ==Walled gardens==
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| − | [[File:Llanerch garden.jpg|right|thumb|200px|Part of the walled garden]]
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| − | Llanerchaeron's walled gardens are home to dozens of veteran fruit trees, some 200 years old, which are part of the working farm's ongoing organic production. These trees are also important hosts for all kinds of insects, mosses and lichens and, coupled with the traditional vegetable and herbaceous flower beds, they are a significant wildlife habitat.<ref>''[http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-chl/w-countryside_environment/w-nature/w-nature-orchards-spring.htm Orchard wildlife]'' National Trust webpage</ref>
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| − | ==Public access==
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| − | The estate's former tenant farmland has now mostly been sold but the house and a considerable area of farm, garden and parkland are opened to the public at limited hours for most of the year on Wednesdays through Sundays, and on other days in a late-summer high season.
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| − | [[The Dylan Thomas Trail]] also passes the estate.
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| − | ===2010 Eisteddfod===
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| − | Llanercheron estate hosted some 100,000 visitors to the 2010 youth cultural festival, the Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Urdd Gobaith Cymru; the Youth Eisteddfod, held between 31 May and 5 June 2010. This compared with the normal attendance rate of about 35,000 visitors annually.<ref>[http://www.urdd.org/eisteddfod/cambrian/2009-10-07+Ymddiriedolaeth_Genedlaethol_Llanerchaeron.pdf Llanerchaeron prepares to welcome Urdd National Eisteddfod] Press publicity column</ref>
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| − | ===Mediæval relics===
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| − | Work in preparation for the Eisteddfod was temporarily halted by the discovery of mediæval relics below the ground.<ref>[http://www.lamp.ac.uk/news/press_releases/2010/dig-with-a-difference.htm Dig With a Difference at Urdd Eisteddfod Site] at University of Lampeter</ref> This tallied with established knowledge of a large mediæval settlement. There were also anxieties over the possibility of disturbing the habitat of otters.<ref>[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/mid_/8634384.stm Otters pose parking threat at Urdd National Eisteddfod] BBC News,21 April 2010</ref>
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| − | ==St Non Church==
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| − | [[File:StNon LAeron.jpg|right|thumb|200px|St Non Church in 2009]]
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| − | [[File:LlaCoachmanCott.jpg|right|thumb|200px|Coachman's cottage by Nash]]
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| − | The parish church of Llannerch Aeron dates back to at least 1284 in the reign of Edward I, when there was a large mediæval village in the adjoining parkland which seems to have been deserted around 1500.<ref name=snhist >Mair Lloyd Evans ''St Non Church Llannerch Aeron in the Diocese of St David'', official 12-page booklet, c. 2008</ref><ref>''[http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-ar3_s_wal.pdf National Trust Annual Archaeological Review]'' (2000-2001), at p. 59 relates that limited magnetometry and excavation [immediately around the church] produced evidence for "thirteenth and fourteenth-century domestic occupation and industrial activity on this site."</ref>
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| − | The cost of the church's remodelling (forty pounds) was met by parishioners, underwritten by Major Lewis. There is no documentation to prove the work was designed by John Nash but it was discussed by a minuted public vestry meeting in 1796, within a year of the completion of Llanayron House.<ref name=snhist/> Nash is known to have at least aided design of other peripheral buildings, a minister's house and a coachman's house not far from the church. The internal restoration of the church was paid for in 1878 by Mary Ashby Lewis, the daughter-in-law of William Lewis, who was widowed for 62 years and died in 1917 aged 104. When her husband John had been interred in the family vault on 13 July 1855, it was diaried by an Aberaeron chemist that "There were nine other coffins there; some had been there over 100 years".<ref name=snhist/> Since the 1920 disestablishment, the church belongs to the [[Church in Wales]].
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| − | ==Outside links==
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| − | *{{NT link}} - information at the National Trust
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| − | * [http://www.coflein.gov.uk/pdf/CPG168/ Heritage assessment]: Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales (Coflein)
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| − | * [http://www.coflein.gov.uk/en/site/3024/images/LLANAERON%3B+LLANERCHAERON+HOUSE/ Online images of the house] at Coflein
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| − | * [http://www.coflein.gov.uk/en/site/408706/details/LLANERCHAERON+DESERTED+MEDIÆVAL+SETTLEMENT/ Llanerchaeron deserted mediæval settlement] at Coflein
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| − | * [http://www.gardens-wales.co.uk/ Gardens of Wales] - Llanerchaeron Gardens
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| − | ==References==
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| − | {{reflist}}
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| − | *Evans N, ''The Llanerchaeron Estate; The built environments, building descriptions and evaluations'' (1998): unpublished document, National Trust
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| − | *Laidlaw R & Palmer C ''Historic park and garden survey, Llanerchaeron'' (1998): unpublished document, National Trust
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| − | *Lloyd T, Untitled paper (1990): with Cadw: Welsh Historic Monuments, Cardiff
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| − | *Tithe Award Survey and Schedule of Apportionments (1839): National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth.
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| − | *Evans Mair Lloyd ''Llanerchaeron, a tale of 10 generations 1634-1989'' (1996).
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| − | *{{cite web|url=http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/wa-10715-llanerchaeron-including-rear-service-cour/photos|title=Llanerchaeron, including rear Service Courtyard Ranges (previously listed as Llanaeron House), Ciliau Aeron|publisher=British Listed Buildings|accessdate=23 August 2014}}
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| − | ===Further reading===
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| − | * Gammack, Helene ''[http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-selfsufficientestate.pdf Components of the self-sufficient estate]'' National Trust publication
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| − | * [http://www.urdd.org/eisteddfod/cambrian.php?lng=en Cambrian News articles] on the 2010 Llanerchaeron Youth Eisteddfod
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| − | [[Category:Gardens in Cardiganshire]]
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| − | [[Category:Lost villages of Cardiganshire]]
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