Cwrt-yr-ala is a neo-Georgian mansion, built in 1939-40, situated on level ground on the north side of a small secluded valley to the east of the village of Wenvoe (nprn 18502). Little is known of its history though the present house lies on the site an eighteenth-century one and much of the layout of the grounds is owed to that. The house lies within a small park (700135) and is surrounded by gardens.

The present-day gardens are the result of the 1939-40 overlay on an earlier layout. They lie to the south, east and west of the house, on ground sloping slightly to the south. The formal gardens to the south and west of the house consist of terraces of varying character. To the south is a wide, stone-flagged terrace with formal beds planted with low-growing shrubs. It is flanked on the south by a swimming pool and, alongside it, a narrow shrub bed. Below is a level, terraced lawn extending along the south side of the garden. A sundial is set at its centre and a flight of steps gives access to the ponds in the valley bottom.

A further formal area to the west of the house is surrounded on the north side and north half of the west side by a high yew hedge. Against the house is a narrow terrace, a conservatory at the north end. Below is a rectangular sunken lawn with a central east-west canal. At the west end of the canal a flight of stone steps leads up to a lead fountain of a standing boy. The lawn is bordered by raised beds bounded above and below with stone walling.

East of the house is the informal wooded area planted mainly with deciduous trees. This is roughly triangular, bordered by the main drive along its south side and on the east by the public road. In the middle of the wood are overgrown stone piers of the former main entrance. The former drive has disappeared but its route is marked by yews which once flanked it. At the east end of the wood is an underground ice-house.

The third main area of the gardens is the mixed woodland to the west of the house. This is bounded on the north by the kitchen garden and former orchard and extends westwards up the valley occupying the steep slope above the valley floor. Doorways from the kitchen garden led to walks through the wood which are now impassable.

The walled kitchen garden lies to the west of the house (700136).

Sources:
Cadw 2000: Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales, Glamorgan, 220-23 (ref: PGW(Gm)42(GLA)).
Ordnance Survey First Edition six-inch map, sheet: Glamorgan XLVII (1878).

RCAHMW, 5 May 2022

Site Record

Cwrt-yr-Ala Garden, Michaelstone-Le-Pit