The site of Lawrenny Castle (nprn 22236) lies about 11km south-west of Haverfordwest. The site has a history dating back to at least the sixteenth century. It occupies a small, almost flat-topped peninsula to the immediate west of Lawrenny village. The most recent house, demolished in 1950, is surrounded by gardens (22237; 700229) which together are located within parkland. The design and layout of the eighteenth century park and gardens was altered radically with the construction of the new house in 1856 when the site was re-fashioned.

The mid-nineteenth century park was an open sweep of some 121 acres the house roughly central to it. It lies on a peninsula formed by the Daugleddau, Cresswell and Carew rivers. The park area forms an arc around Lawrenny village, bounded on the west by the village and the public road north, and elsewhere by woodland and farmland.  

The park, known as a deer-park by the late nineteenth century, was created mid century from 10-12 enclosures which included a horse park, an orchard, and 96 acres of woodland. Cutting through several enclosures was the Long Walk, a mid-eighteenth century avenue, now gone. Later nineteenth-century maps depict a protective wall and ditch separating park and garden which remains in good condition.

Much of the parkland to the north and west is now turned over to arable farming and `community forest'. To the south-east of the house the land is shown as dotted with trees on late nineteenth century maps but is now enclosed open ground with some woodland strips. Woodland (Lawrenny Wood) still exists around the estuaries. Within the parkland area is St Caradoc's Church (300183).
The site lies within the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park and the National Trust owns part of the woodland to the south-west of the house site.

Sources:
Cadw 2002: Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales, Carmarthenshire, Ceredigion and Pembrokeshire, 244-8 (ref: PGW(Dy)36(PEM)).
Ordnance Survey County Series six-inch plan: sheet Pembrokeshire XXXIV.7 (first edition  1863).
Additional notes: D.K.Leighton.

RCAHMW, 8 June 2022