PLAS COCH - OUR HISTORY

Plas Coch is one of Anglesey’s most distinctive historic houses.

The date - 1569 - engraved over the front entrance shows that it was built about 450 years ago, in the time of Elizabeth I. The house stands on the site of an earlier medieval dwelling, Porthamel Isaf.

The House

The flamboyant Renaissance architectural style of Plas Coch reflects strong Flemish influence.

Plas Coch is constructed of red sandstone, quarried on-site, close to the house.  Extensions were made in the Victorian period, in the same style.

Historical Context

The house was built at a time of transition and change in Anglesey.  As memories of the Edwardian Conquest (1282) and Glendower Rebellion (1400-1415) faded, many native Welsh appear to have reconciled themselves to the inevitable dominance of their more powerful English neighbours.  The accession of the Tudors to the English throne in 1485 made this more palatable – the Tudor having originated from Anglesey.

Increasingly from then on, enterprising Welsh gentry involved themselves in local government and professional careers in London, whilst retaining their Welsh heritage.  The more successful amongst them also accumulated estates and substantial new houses, with the aim of bringing prestige to their families.

Plas Coch was one such houses and estate.

The 'Ruin'

The coach-house 'ruin' was built as a coach house for Plas Coch in around the 1850s.

The roads which lead to Plas Coch today are not those of an earlier period.  A tree-lined avenue led from the south front of the mansion, linking with the road to Moel y Don, one of the main important ferries which crossed the Straits.  The avenue is no longer used but the line of the trackway is visible in low light.  The Moel y Don ferry carried foot passengers and horses, not coaches.  In fact, on account of the state of the roads in North Wales, no coaches crossed the Straits until the late 18th century.  On the northern, back-side, of the mansion a track led from the house to a stone quarry near the west- east, Trefarthen to Llanfairpwllgwyngyll, road.

By the 1840s a third road was provided on the eastern side. This drive, a spur from the Llanddaniel to the Moel y Don ferry road, brought carriages to the back of the house and a building immediately to the north-east of the mansion may have been a coach house or stables.  The entrance to the drive was close to the future site of the East Lodge, built around 1845, and was probably created to allow carriages to reach the house.

By the 1850s, landscaping, which included the creation of an ornamental lake, required a realignment of the drive to bring visitors to the front of the house.  In the process the old stables or agricultural building was demolished.  It was replaced and the site chosen for a new coach-house was that of the 'ruin' on the north side of the lake, across the ornamental bridge.  There was already a structure in that location, at the south end of a walled garden, aligned north-south.

In the 1850s, the Bangor architect, Henry Kennedy, was at work rebuilding the nearby parish church of Llanedwen.  At the same time, Kennedy made designs for a coach-house and stables for Plas Coch.  The old building, north of the lake, was remodelled and extended with a west-east range.

The gable ends of the original north-south structure and the east end of the new west-east building were embellished with 'crow-steps', mirroring the mansion house, although the 'steps' are in a rudimentary squared-off style, lacking the finesse of the originals. Two large round-arched doors stand central to the west-east range with smaller doors, flanked by large windows, on either side.  The windows are an attractive stone-mullioned and transome type with ovolo (egg-shaped) mouldings. The mouldings reflect aspects of the main house windows but the style is Victorian Gothic, and, in detail, are quite different. The southerly projection of the west wing also carries a pair of large round-arched openings. These were designed to accommodate carriages. Kennedy's original mid-19th century design for the coach-house also incorporated stables, a loose-box and saddle room.

Later in the 20th century the building was re-used as a shop, cafe, launderette and wine bar as part of the facilities of the holiday complex at that time, in the 1970s and 80s. The evidence of fire is clearly seen on the timber lintels of the coach house doors and this conflagration may have contributed to the damage done to the moulded stone windows, all now broken.

The 'ruin', now consolidated and restored, stands as a picturesque and atmospheric reminder of the old coaching days at Plas Coch.