[1] Robert Raikes was a prominent member of the Oxford-based Christian Tractarian movement, and moved his family to Wales in order to promote his beliefs and assist in the development of the area.

[2] The house was designed by John Loughborough Pearson, a young architect who was just beginning to experiment with the revived Gothic style of architecture.

[2] Pearson was also asked by Raikes to modernise the church at Llangasty and build a school – both of which are at the end of the lane which leads down to Llangorse Lake.

[6] The most prominent tenants during that time were Abraham Darby 4th and his wife Matilda Frances, of Coalbrookdale, owner of the Ebbw Vale Steel Works.

[3] Robert Scourfield and Richard Haslam, in their 2013 revision of the Powys Pevsner Buildings of Wales series, follow Girouard, and consider that the house is "better than the massing of [Pugin's] Scarisbrick Hall or Alton".