An elegant but restrained essay in a rural Federal idiom, Norwood is situated in Clarke County’s Chapel Rural Historic District, at the end of a maple-shaded lane amid immaculately maintained grounds. The house is on what was originally part of a 1760 land patent from Thomas, Lord Fairfax and was built around 1819 for Lewis Neill who inherited the property from his grandfather. Although expanded with later wings, the original two-story core with its exceptionally large windows, its unusual transverse hall, and spacious double parlors remains little altered. Nearly all the original woodwork is intact, including the wooden Federal mantels based on Philadelphia marble prototypes. The property was given its present name by William D. McGuire, who purchased the farm in 1858. Norwood is one of Clarke County’s few important Federal houses to have been built by descendants of Irish settlers from Pennsylvania rather than members of Tidewater Virginia families of English descent.