Penpont, located in the picturesque Usk valley, is one of the most historic and important houses in Brecknock (nprn 16026). It possesses a small landscape park, formal and informal gardens (700365); and a walled kitchen garden with heated glasshouses (422153). It is remarkable for the survival, in a highly picturesque situation, of its early nineteenth-century park and garden, influenced by Repton, with remains of an earlier formal layout, including some of the first larch trees in Britain. Features continue to be put into the park, including a maze.

The park lies on either side of the river Usk and extends to the south of the road (A40) where the ground rises towards the Brecon Beacons. The Great Pond, is at the top of the park. In the wooded valley below the Great Pond was a string of five small ponds, and one lower one. There is also some relict parkland tree planting, including beech, oak, pine, horse and sweet chestnut and a wellingtonia. Beech remain along the boundary wall and in a clump on the high ground east of the Great Pond. Some beech trees are the remnants of an avenue which ran from Pen-y-parc to the mountain gate. These developments date to the 1770s under Penry Williams II (1714-81).

Penry III continued the family’s interest in landscaping; Humphry Repton’s Observations on the theory and practice of landscape gardening (1805 edition) was given to Penry by his wife Maria in March 1806 and probably inspired further developments in the grounds, which coincided with the improvements to the house. Penry Williams III’s layout is shown on the 1891 Ordnance Survey map and survives to this day. He made the picturesque walk through woodland, via a tunnel under the road and beside the stream in Cwm Lodge.

The gently-sloping pasture fields of the park to the north of the A40 lie between the road and the river Usk. In the early nineteenth century a long, curving ha-ha was made on the eastern boundary of the gardens, allowing views out over the park and the landscape beyond. To the south of the house and garden a narrow area of parkland slopes up gently from the house to the A40 and is dotted with large, mature deciduous trees, particularly oak, sweet chestnut and sycamore.

A picturesque, unsurfaced walk runs along the river bank from the road to Abersefin Farm, next to the bridge (23751), with an iron pedestrian gate at the entrance. It runs through yew trees and on westwards through a now incomplete avenue of closely planted oaks of considerable size and height.

Sources:
Cadw 1999: Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales, Powys, (ref: PGW (Po)21(POW)).
Ordnance Survey six-inch map sheet: Brecknockshire XXVII.SW (1887).
Additional notes: C.S.Briggs.

RCAHMW, 12 July 2022