Cardiff New Cemetery was opened in 1859. Cemetery House was a lodge at the main entrance, close to the Anglican and non-conformist chapels, and was probably designed by R.G. Thomas, architect of Newport, who designed the chapels.

Gothic style, 1? storey, lodge built of snecked, rock-faced sandstone with lighter freestone dressings, and with a banded slate roof with overhanging eaves, bracketed and with barge boards to the gables. On the south side are two rendered brick stacks, while the north gable end has a brick and stone stack.
The asymmetrical, double-fronted, east entrance faces Fairoak Road and is partly concealed behind the heightened perimeter wall of the cemetery. It has a central boarded door under a pointed overlight and hood mould with foliage stops. Above the doorway is a raked 2-light dormer. To the left of the doorway is an advanced gabled bay. It has a canted bay window with hipped stone slab roof, and mullions with shafts and foliage capitals, a cornice with foliage stops, and 2-pane sash windows. The gable is half hipped. The attic has a 2-light window with cusped-headed lights incorporating casements, a central shafted mullion, and sill with foliage stops, all beneath a pointed relieving arch with small trefoil. To the right of the doorway is a 2-light canted bay window battered below the sill, with 2-pane sash window under a hipped slate roof. The 2-light attic window has cusped-headed lights incorporating 2-pane sashes, below a relieving arch with small pointed trefoil and beneath a gablet.

The south side wall faces the cemetery entrance. It has an L-shaped lean-to porch comprising an arcade of cusped arches (originally open but now glazed) on a dwarf wall, with cusped wooden arch to the L. Inside the porch is a pointed window facing the entrance and on its right a boarded storm door with strap hinges. The door to the house is panelled. On the right side of the porch is a cusped lancet window, while a small trefoil attic window is upper left over the porch.

On the left side of the porch is the gable end of a projecting rear wing, which has barge boards and eaves brackets similar to the front. A canted bay window is battered below sill level and hipped slab roof over a cornice with foliage stops. The central 2-pane sash window is beneath a shouldered lintel while the side lights have cusped heads. A 2-light attic window with cusped headed lights and relieving arch is similar to the east front. Set back on the left side is a rear outshut, its south wall having a 4-pane sash window in a dressed surround and relieving arch. An inserted window is in the rear wall, and a rear porch is on its north side.

The rear wall of the main range, to the left of the rear wing, has a single-storey lean-to with casement window in a dressed surround, on the right side of which is a shallow projection, the roof of which is concealed behind a parapet. It has a cusped light in its north wall and a dressed surround to a casement window in the lower storey facing the rear. The north gable end of the rear wing has a large 4-pane sash window in the lower storey and a 2-light window with cusped heads in the upper storey, both with relieving arches similar to the front. The north gable end of the main range has 2 attic sashes.

On the north side of the house is a stable of snecked rock-faced stone and lighter freestone dressings, and slate roof with overhanging eaves, and yellow brick ridge stack left of centre. Facing the yard to the south, are central full-height double doors with strap hinges, beneath a gablet incorporating an overlight. On the left side is a doorway with double diagonal-boarded doors with strap hinges. On the right side is a 2-light mullioned window. The left (west) gable end has 2 openings with shouldered lintels, and pointed quatrefoil to the apex.
(source; Cadw listing database) S Fielding RCAHMW 05/07/2006