Pencerrig’s stables/coach house was built in the mid 1700s, possibly by Thomas Jones senior whose 1768 portrait by Giuseppe Marchi is described in Richard Veasey’s book, ‘Thomas Jones Pencerrig’ as “Over Thomas senior’s left shoulder, we see in the background his country house together with a grand red-brick stable block”.  This detail from the painting is reproduced in the book, ‘Pencerrig and its past families’, written by Penelope Bourdillon whose husband, Mervyn Bourdillon, inherited the Llwyn Madoc estate.  A further drawing of Pencerrig and the stables is featured in RCB Oliver’s 1969 booklet, ‘Pencerrig: House at the top of the rocks’ which he suggests was made around 1831, possibly by Clara Thomas. 

 In both pictures the stables is instantly recognisable as the building described in the 1952 sale of the Pencerrig estate but its use having been altered to accommodate automobiles.  The old petrol pump can be seen in the photo of my brother, Geoff Carrel, shoeing a pony in the stable yard (circa 1970).  Unfortunately, the mature trees in front of the building made it difficult to photograph but it was still a very attractive and well used building 200 years later.

Two heavy sliding doors had replaced the two original ground floor windows to the  right of the central double doors and the floor had been concreted - these modifications, together with the heating pipes mentioned in the 1952 sales spec, were probably made at the same time as the petrol pump was installed in the early 1900s.

As a pony trekking centre, these stables were integral to our business but the first and second floors were rarely used, except for storage, as some of the floorboards were rotten in places.  The weathervane, set on top of the larger of the two wooden hexagonal towers, was a Welsh Dragon, possibly made of bronze, and this is depicted in the drawing reproduced by RCB Oliver.

The building backed onto the rear lane behind Pencerrig (seen in the last photo) which ran from the main road down to the Home Farm.  Just like Pencerrig, the West facing back wall of the stables was partially underground, so the rear entrance (and only entrance) to the first floor was via a footpath rising approximately 10 feet above the level of the East facing front entrances to the stables and garage on the cobblestone yard. There were three rooms along this back wall, the first was a narrow storage room (never used) with no windows but it had a door on the gable end nearest the house (photo attached); the second was our tack room, reached via an internal door through the stables.  The tack room had two short windows which looked directly out on to the sloping back lane where they appeared at ground level.  The third room contained the forge with its anvil and furnace - this room had a gable end door and a window looking out down towards the Home Farm.  Our blacksmith, Bryn Morgan, had his own forge in Builth so this forge was rarely used but my brother, Geoffrey, learned the skill well enough to replace the odd lost shoe between Bryn’s visits.  

In front of these rear rooms were the stables, as described in the 1952 sales particulars, ie three stalls and a loose box for horses, and next to this was a very large room which could easily accommodate 4 vehicles but we never used it as a garage.  The large cobblestone yard at the front of the building was swept and washed down daily after the ponies were returned to their fields.

Pencerrig stables was given Grade ll listed status in the 1960s which essentially prevented any plans we had to convert the upper floors into private living accommodation.  Sadly, after the new owners took over the hotel in 1978 the building fell into a state of disrepair and was eventually demolished to make way for a modern extension to the hotel.  The photo of the stable roof showing missing slates was taken in the spring of 1981and it was shortly after this that the building was lost for ever.