St. Mary's, Tintern

A cobbled path winds its way up a hill from the village of Tintern. It is covered in leaves and mud and the path seems to have been seldom used. As I walked up it a high stone wall appeared on my left, vegetation sprouting from the gaps between the stones.  At the end of the wall two old gates, rusted and left open led into an over grown graveyard.  I entered and spent a while looking up at the ruins of the Grade II listed Church of St Mary. The church is of medieval origin but was virtually re-built in 1886.  The life of the church as we see today would span less than a hundred years before it was made redundant and then  set on fire in 1977. History is sketchy to  how the church’s fate was sealed, was it accident or arson?  Indeed the history of this building is hard to discover at all! It is a romantic site, the graveyard,  largely left to nature  has a few paths cutting through it, which made  finding the best view-points easier, however, the morning dew that  lay on the ground soon soaked  through my shoes and penetrated to my socks. The location is beautiful ; perched on  a hill, the views look out down the valley, where just visible in the distance are the ruins of Tintern Abbey.

Walking up to the church door I took a closer look at the tower, which somehow had survived the fire of 1977. The roof remains although holes are visible. The walls of the tower have been resilient against the last 35 years of weather, Inside a different picture is painted. The walls are now largely covered in ivy and stones have fallen and now lie scattered on the ground. There are some signs of an attempt being made to cap off the walls many years previously.  The delicate stone window to the east of the building is chipped and looks weak. Saplings grow from between the tiles and nature is trying to reclaim the site.  An old cellar lies beneath part of the church, the floor long gone I trod carefully around the edge, not wanting to end up falling in. The church still boasts some  beautiful stone carvings.

I had made my visit at a good time of year as winter had stripped the lush green vegetation from the walls  making it easier to inspect its condition.  St Marys is a romantic ruin, one that I think should remain a ruin. But for it to remain at all, work must be done to stop it from being enveloped by nature.

-Tim James

Organised Kaos Youth Circus- Cwmamman Church Hall

The Cwmamman Church Hall was in operation during the 19th century and fell out of operation, into a dire state of disrepair. Luckily it was remembered by Nicola Hemsley, the Director of Organised Kaos, a local circus company. Nicola has fond memories of the Church Hall as it was the first stage that she performed on, it was because of this that she decided to take on this building as her company's permanent venue. Bringing the circus to an area which has a lack of resources and saving the building for the community, good for her!

She found the place lacking foundations and discovered that the heat had caused the floor to collapse! Following their agreement on a long lease of 25 years in August 2011, work began to secure the funding needed and plan a hectic restoration project. It has been a labour of love and at present, phases 1-3 are complete; this is including the porch, the kitchen and toilets and she is ideally looking at a Summer completion, lets hope it all goes to plan!


Click here to see more information on Organised Kaos and the project: www.organisedkaos.org.uk

Neuadd Fawr: A classical beauty

North of the small Carmarthenshire village of Cilycwm and surrounded by beautiful countryside stands Neuadd Fawr, a classically fronted grade II listed mansion set within its own parkland. The house was originally built in 1784 and was subsequently enlarged and remodeled in the 1820s to the neo-classical house we see today. The house remained with the original family until it was transformed into a school in 1940. It then had a brief stint as a youth hostel before being passed back to a distant member of the family. However the upkeep of the house was ignored and the rot set in.

The house now stands in a field, fenced off and open to the elements. The roof, although still in situ, now heavily undulates and holes are appearing where the slates have slipped allowing the wind and rain to penetrate deep into the fabric of the building. Trees have sunk their roots into the masonry, pushing the cast iron ionic columns of the porch out of line. Inside, the staircase with its Egyptian lotus leaf banisters has long gone and so too have the fireplaces and panelling. The first floor has largely collapsed, leaving the upper walls and doors seemingly floating in space. My initial impression, that this building seemed to be in fairly good order, were now gone! The precarious state of the inside shocked me; I would not be venturing in! It left me with a feeling that time is running out for this fine building. It will just take a single part of the roof to collapse and the process of decay will dramatically speed up. The out buildings surrounding the mansion are in a similar state, apart from the main stable block. They are now roofless and have cracks appearing in the walls and look in a desperate state.

In 1996 the owner applied for permission to demolish the house, but this was turned down. The building was then transferred into the ownership of a limited company to reduce any impact to the surrounding farmland should the house be the subject of a compulsory purchase order. The house is landlocked with no direct access. What will the future hold? Surely the best option for this building is to revert back to its original use as a large family house. I have no doubt at all that if Neuadd Fawr was to be placed on the open market it would be snapped up in no time at all. Few houses evoke emotions like this one. Let's hope that someone steps in to save this glorious building.....before it's too late.

 

-Tim James (http://crumbling-houses.com/)

Liz Bolloten, a Conwy artist

I had the very real pleasure of visiting Plas Brynkir earlier this year. I had already put together some watercolours of the site, and when there was opportunity to visit, I jumped at it. Just experiencing it in all its faded grandeur inspired me further. Two important books are out this year. Mark Baker's book: Y plas (on the Welsh Country House) and Timothy James book: Crumbling Historic Houses. These books are very relevant in drawing attention to what is our heritage, and history, and if these sites are lost forever, we ourselves are diminished. As for me I am always looking for excuses to paint old buildings and would welcome opportunities to do so. I feel a great need to record their beauty as a historic reference: that they were indeed here and have absorbing stories to tell.

 These beautiful paintings are available from Love My Wales as postcards for £2.50 and as prints ordered from Liz directly for £30 plus £5 postage. Originals are £250 each

 

 - Liz Bolloten Art

Four Elms, Adamsdown- A restored building at risk

An interesting project has recently come to a close at Four Elms, a Grade II listed school building in Adamstown, Cardiff. The redevelopment of this beautiful building was undertaken by NoFit State, a 27 year old circus company. The redevelopment of this beautiful building was to facilitate NoFit State’s venue on a permanent basis.

Four Elms was originally built by the United Methodist Church and was opened on 5^th September 1896 and was owned by the church until 1978 when it was sold to the Cardiff County Borough Council, it later became nearly derelict and at risk. Then wonderful news came for Four Elms when No Fit State stumbled upon it in 2007, who started to look into the possibilities of acquiring it from the Cardiff County Council. It was then awarded by a long lease, then with the help of funders such as the Big Lottery Fund, Garfield Weston Foundation and Admiral Insurance, have restored it to a fully functional, entertaining and a fulfilling community venue. This is exactly the sort of thing that Love My Wales encourages and to them we say “well done!”

“For me this is an amazing regeneration project.  I love the fact that it is actually going to belong to people and not just a private firm.  Making something really beautiful from a building that has been so neglected.”

- Zoe Munn, Four Elms Development Officer

If you would like to see more from NoFit State, please visit their website: www.nofitstate.org

Day 20

At last the 30th is here, the day of the big open day! We didn't know what to expect today, but it was a great success! We started off by having the BBC here who did a live broadcast for Radio 1 to advertise the Open Day. It was a great help as we had over 60 people come from the local area! A lot came with their own memories of the site and varying age groups, which is always nice to see. We had lots of interest in our pull up displays which I am very pleased with as I put a lot of effort into them. The students couldn't be split into groups like before so it was all very casual with tours, luckily we had the help of Megan, a local girl who offered to do the welsh tours for us. This was very handy as we had a lot of Welsh speakers come to the open day. I feel it went very well and everyone got a tour. We were also visited by a local woman who had photographs of the Lower House from 1990, it serves as a good document of how the site has degraded over the last 20 years, so we were glad to have them.

Day 19

The students really felt the burn today. Lots of things to do on what is technically their last day. Some again were cleaning finds and others were recording their trenches and filling in the completed ones for next year. There's lots to do though and I think it might have to run into tomorrow's open day. This would be unideal but on the other hand, it is nice for the visitors to see what work goes on at an archaeological dig. Antonia Dewhurst also came today to give a talk about her photography and art projects that she has going on. I really liked the talk as I myself am really into the technical aspects of photography.

We all then went to Aberdunant to enjoy an end of dig meal, Antonia also came along! Aberdunant was actually where the last Brynker, Jane Brynker died in 1760. So its a very relevant place to eat!

Day 18

There are lots of finds to wash and sort! Some students got on with cleaning their finds. While others got on with digging and recording their trenches. Trench C was photographed as more of the wall was uncovered. We are unsure what is is as it also looks like a quarry! S the students started scraping it clean.

Day 17

Today the pressure is rising to get things done. Jess and Louise got on with their profile drawings of Trench E. We seem to have found a wall in Trench C as Harriet and Cat have uncovered! The rest worked avidly to clear and document their trenches in preparation for the upcoming open day!

Day 16

Today was very hard work. Under Mark's supervision, Jay and Louise did a stone survey. Recordings were also done in Trench H with Harriet and Cat working on profile drawings. Jess was clearing Trench E today. Even I got down on site and had a go at clearing the trees with David inside the Lower House, to stop the overgrowth and hopefully kill it off. Culling the trees is very important to conserving the ruins as the roots destroy the building's foundations and roots and ivy grow through the mortar, so its pretty important to sort that issue! We also cleared the pathways to give better and safer access for the visitors at the open day on the 31st. The students were later visited by Dilwyn, an archivist who gave a talk on the history of the area and spoke of the various influential families and Welsh Houses of importance in the area. We later yet again tried to get inside Llanfihangel-y-Pennant to see the various artefacts but were unsuccessful.

Day 15

Its a sad time when a trench gets filled in. Trench G was showing very few results and was filled in, I suppose it was for the best though. Alex and James recorded it, photographed it, planned and sectioned the Trench before burying it. They then moved down to Trench D at the Lower House and continued on with that as we were concious that the secondary school students might want to use the archery range, however they have yet to use it. In the mean time, Trench H was recorded by Chloe and Cat. Nothing much exciting in regards to find as of yet however. I'm sure there will be soon though, got to keep up the morale and go through it. We saw Ceri again today, she came with more reproduction artworks of the Lower House and arranged with Mark to have a reproduction image of the Upper House detailing the gatehouse in around 1700. Really excited to see what she makes!

Day 14

Today was an Open Day for two local societies, the Welsh Historic Garden's Trust (WHGT) and the Council for the Protection of Rural Wales (CPRW). The students were very nervous and we were expecting figures of 40 or so people! Mark took the nervous students around the site to remind them of the various features to point out when giving a guided tour. They were divided into 4 groups, 2 students in each one, each starting in a different location and moving like clock work around the site in 15 minute slots. It was pretty manic, but very successful indeed! We had good feedback and the students seemed pretty proud of what they had accomplished. We are also sharing the hostel with a group of secondary school students, so its all pretty packed! They seem nice though and are pretty friendly.

Day 13

We were visited by a representative of the Gwynedd Archaeological Trust who came to make sure that the site was being managed in a proper manner. We passed and were very happy to hear that we are doing really well. It's always nice to be complimented for good work. The students had some exciting finds including a stretch of cobbled flooring which has stump posts. It's very interesting and is possibly a medieval feature which surprisingly was only just under the surface. You can see a drain pipe too which was put in there in the 1940s which unfortunately means that some of the flooring was destroyed to fit this in. The students also found some 17th Century glazed pottery, which is a very early find! Although in my opinion, the best find was a foundation stone of the Upper House, otherwise known as a Basel Stone which was found in Trench E. The Students in Trench F spent their time cleaning stones. The evidence found so far at Brynkir is suggesting that the Archery Range at the Upper House is where the Hunting Lodge for the Deer Park was. We have also been researching into the written texts of Brynkir and have had some transcriptions done by students who wanted to do indoor work and have found evidence to suggest that the Lower House was built onto an earlier structure, which William Huddart recalled. We also found references of the Greaves family referring to the Lower House as the "Tudor Building". It's all very exciting and it gave Mark a lot to talk about in his lecture which he gave to the students in preparation for tomorrow's open day!

Day 12

It was submission today for pottery reports, the students had to write 500 words on a chosen piece of pottery found at Brynkir. As it was their first assignment, you can expect there was a little bit of a panic to get it done! However as it turned out, they were all very good. So panic over, the students went on to do their trenches. Trench E, which is just outside the Archery Range was extended following the discovery of what appears to be a wall, which is very exciting. Mark left us however for various meetings in North Wales, leaving myself and Sarah holding the fort for a few days Will we cope? I should hope so!

We opened up a new trench (H) to find the foundations of the gate house which we are looking for, while Jay continued drawing out her stone survey.

Day 11 at Brynkir!

Warren came back this morning and we all went to Dolbenmaen Castle where Llewelyn the Great, one of the Princes of Gwynedd held his court in the 1220s until his move to Criccieth Castle in 1230. The students also learnt of the different mortar styles through the centuries, looking at a 19th century church which was a rebuild from a much earlier church opposite the castle. We moved on to Penarth Fawr, a 13th-14th century manor house, identical to our Upper House. It is Very similar stylistically and in very good condition following its rebuild in 1656 following a fire which was ignited on Cromwell's orders. I loved how white and pristine the lime-wash was and knowing how the Upper House would have looked in the late medieval period brought a whole new dimension to the project in my opinion.

So the students came back and worked on their trenches. The Geophysics results have really influenced this dig and made it very exciting! Jess stopped drawing her plans and got in her amazing trench to dig away at Trench E and Jay went on to do the stone survey. We were also greeted by a local archaeologist called Bitt Jones who took a tour of the site.

Day 10- Moving to the Upper House!

Today the Students have moved to the Upper House, just outside what the hostel used to use as an archery range and opened three test pits Trenches E-G in order to find the possible gatehouse and doorway which would have been parallel to the house. Meanwhile on the research side of things, Mark took two of the students with him to meet the Reverend Dylan Parry in order to try and get access to the church where the Brynkers were buried. The church has been abandoned for forty years and the key has been lost since.

Trench F found a Basal Stone, one of the foundation stones of the building. Trench E has also found part of a wall. However, Trench G has yet to find anything of interest.

Day 9- when they studied stones!

In the morning, the students carried on their normal routine. They finished their drawings and opened another trench, Trench D. In the afternoon Andrew, a geologist from Cardiff Museum came to show us about the different building materials both the upper and lower house were made out of. I took some documentation photos and learnt about different mason marks and how to tell the difference between different stones. It was interesting to learn the technique of quarrying known as 'Plug and Feather', where the stone was chiselled deep and moved around until the rock split into two.
 

An example of a mark caused by Plug and Feather

The rest of the day, the students continued in their trenches. We are thinking of moving to the Upper House soon to open new trenches!

Day 8 at Plas Brynkir!

Today was an awful day for the weather! it started raining and was very murky. The students were greeted by a special visitor, Spencer Gavin Smith, a specialist in Deer Parks. Spencer took the students round the site and had a good look around to find features typical of Deer Parks that he knew of. He was here for most of the day and left at about 4:00, there was a lot to see! He pointed out various features such as terraces and ditches that were relative to controlling how the deer ran and at what speed and sought to identify the killing field. He also gave a lecture on various different sites to help the students understand the different features relevant.

After Spencer left, the students carried on in their trenches despite the weather.

Day 7 at the site!

Today's been fairly quiet. We found a possible wall in Jess, Chloe and James's trench! its not been exposed much yet although its an amazing discovery, maybe its part of another wing on the building. We still need to confirm it but it seems likely because its an arrangement to stones mortared together. It amazes me that modern science can find buried stone structures and produce an image similar to an x-ray almost. Most of the students simply carried on digging for all of today with not to much to report, Harriet though stayed indoors to transcribe some of the Huddart's accounts from 1813.

I fear the weather is on the turn this afternoon, but I hope it isn't because it would mean the students would have to be stuck indoors drawing plans! has to be done though I suppose.

Day 6 at Plas Brynkir

The day began with the students going down to the Lower House to continue on their test pits. From results found yesterday, it was time for the well positioned pits to be extended into the student's first trenches! The students dug until 11:00, when they enjoyed a small break and went back down until 13:00 when they came back for their lunch. While they were eating, Bettina Harden came up to see the site and give a lecture on historic Welsh gardens. The lecture started at 14:00 (after some complications with the projector!) and went on until 15:30, when everyone left the Training Room and settled for tea and cakes, leaving Mark, Sarah and Bettina to tour the grounds.

The day resumed as normal and the students went down to the site and continued digging. Some interesting results cropped up towards the end of the day, Alex found a flowerbed and pathway in his trench, which is an exciting discovery! In the mean time, we were greeted by David Will, who came to do 3D renders of the site and trenches for the open day! He will be with us on and off for the duration of the dig. Of course, the students were able to meet their new house-mate at 5:30 when they came back from the trenches.

The flowerbed trench!

Day 5: The day they dug!

The students were really excited to go down to the Lower House to work on their test pits, so much so they all rushed out of bed and ran down to the site! ... well it played that way in my mind! I mean, they are students after all! In all seriousness, they were quite excited to crack on and do some "real Archaeology". The day went very quickly, but unfortunately they didn’t reveal anything amazing and new. All pits revealed lots of pottery fragments and bits of glass dating back to the Victorian and late Georgian eras, we were not disappointed as today we were mostly aiming at breaking the surface and getting stuck into it. It's early days! Tomorrow we are expecting to extend the successful test pits and create trenches which the students are looking forward to.

Today also saw the arrival of Nigel Bowen-Morris, Love My Wales’s newest Trustee! He's an absolutely charming man and will be staying with us in the Hostel for a few days. He's visiting to catch up with the work that Love My Wales has been up to. We also welcomed Sarah Doherty, the co-director of the dig. It’s always nice to have new people come to stay.

Tim greeted the students with a talk explaining his initial results from the Geophysical survey. The talk was extremely interesting and suggested that there might be a hidden wing of the Upper House in the old Archery Range and also a walled structure or pathway might be under the back of the Lower House. The students then had a lecture by Margaret Dunn, who came to talk about Dendrochronology- the study of dating locations with trees. While this was happening, Tim spoke to me and Mark about the discoveries from his survey and suggested interesting locations to place test pits. After this, Tim and Emrys left... I'm sure they'd be happy to hear that everyone misses their company, especially Emrys! By this time, the students had left their lecture. Margaret's talk gave an interesting insight to the dating of sites by simply surveying their surroundings and left after their morning tea break at 11:20. The students were fascinated with what Margaret had to say and found her very pleasant company.

Some of the finds so far!

After tea, Margaret took a personal tour of the site with Mark, and left shortly afterwards. Mark then planned from this where we should start digging our test pits and the students categorised their findings to date in chronological order until the later afternoon and eventually followed him down to the back yard of the Lower House and plotted their three test pits all 1 metre squared and scratched away at the surface. Not much was excavated however as the students ended up going down at 4:00 with their day ending at 5:30. I’m really excited to see what comes up!!

Day 3 at Plas Brynkir

The day began early at 9:00 again, beginning with a talk and Mark's departure from the site. I was in charge and had to split the group into half, one to carry on clearing the ground in the morning, and the other to help Tim with the geophysics. The two groups of four were then split into twos, the pairs clearing worked from both ends of the bottom terrace and cleared  up until they met in the middle. The groups then swapped over following lunch. They did a very good job and you can now see a lot of the terraces and how they were arranged.

Yesterday saw the beginning of the Geophysical survey with Tim. I really enjoyed taking part and learnt a lot about the process of archaeology. As a keen photographer, I also took a  interest in the idea of electric signals creating something similar to a black and white photograph or an x-ray image of the ground. Tim took the students around the terraces and surveyed the area to find any lost structures and managed quite impressively to do the whole thing! The results are in the process of being composed, I'm very excited to see what the earth is hiding from us. The students worked until 7:00 PM, they were that eager!

Day 2 at the Plas Brynkir Site

The nerve centre of the project itself, the Training Room at the Cwm Pennant Hostel 

Today, the students got up for a 9:00 start in Training Room where they were briefed on their day's work. It was a day of clearance, beating nature back to reveal Brynkir's medieval garden. Eight students split
up into groups of four to tackle the overgrowth. I must say, they did a very good job indeed! Led by Emrys, our very own conservation expert, we revealed some top part of the neglected terraced garden. We also discovered a 19th century stone wall standing between the Upper House and the driveway from the terraces. There was also the remains of the small iron fence which would have been drilled into the wall.

Before I write any further, I think a brief summary of Brynkir's history is in order! The Estate is made of two main ruins, The Upper House and Lower House. On the top of the hill, we have The Upper House which is an early mansion on the site and was built in the mid 15th Century to house an Aristocratic Welsh family which later became the Brynker family following the adoption of the name in the 1600s (they named themselves after the Estate). The Upper House is on top of a terraced garden, aligned with the lake under it and the valley beyond. The mansion stayed in use until the death of Jane Brynker in 1760. The Estate passed hands to the Huddart family in around 1800 who soon built a much larger Regency Villa known as the Lower House, which became the main residence until the 1860s when the site was abandoned. The Estate was visited sporadically until its final abandonment in the first decade of the 20th Century.

The above images show the Upper House (left image by Emrys Ruck, 2013) and the much later Lower House (right image by Antonia Dewhurst, 2012). A fascinating difference in style documenting the eras in which they were built.

After clearance, Tim from Cardiff University came to do a geophysical survey of the back of the Lower House, which I personally helped in! Very interesting device which sends electric signal into the ground through the moisture. Because stone and brick has hardly any moisture in, the signal bounces back and when used with specific software on a computer, draws a map of any lost walls or pathways that are present underground. The results came back with an irregular arrangement of stones under us, could it be another building? Very exciting stuff! Tomorrow we will be doing a geophisical survey of the terraces to see what lost relics there are there!

Day 1 at the Plas Brynkir Site

Brynkir Lower House from the back. Photographed by Antonia Dewhurst, 2012

Here we are on the first day of twenty-eight in total at the archaeological site of Plas Brynkir! It was a long journey from Cardiff and with an added perk of visiting Cornelia, the owner of Plas Teg who was good enough to give us a cup of tea and a tour of her home. We arrived last night and were eventually greeted by our lovely volunteers and also finds of pottery right away from the old Midden including bits of Pottery from the Huddart family!

Finds from day 1!

Plas Brynkir is an important site which Love My Wales is working on, it is an abandoned medieval Welsh Estate in Dolbenmaen, Gwynedd and shows strong evidence that it was once a Deer Park for the native Welsh Princes. With the help of eight students from Cardiff University and various volunteers who will pop up this month, we will be undergoing a geophysical survey as well as an archaeological excavation which we are hoping will prove this theory. Today the students had their inductions to the Cwm Pennant Hostel, where we are staying including a health and safety brief from Luke, the manager as well as project brief from Mark, who is leading the event. The students also had their first glimpse of the site during their walk. They were also fortunate enough to have our volunteer, Emrys, who specialises in natural conservation. He spoke to them of various species which live on the site including Badgers, Wren, Blackbirds and different Amphibians. He also spoke of the consequences of various types of conservation on the environment and the importance to maintain the natural habitat as well as the conservation of the ruins themselves. Later on in the day, we were visited by a lovely artist called Liz Bolloten who has produced some beautiful paintings of Brynkir which I will upload on another blog post when they are updated (www.lizbolloten.co.uk) and also the amazing Ceri Leeder who is painting artist reconstructions of the ruins at Brynkir.

One of Ceri Leeder's reconstruction pieces of the Lower House

Plas Dulas is a site Southwest of Llanddulas and is an unlisted gardens and ruins. The land started life as a late eighteenth century farm and was built on as a small summer residence in the 1820s by Sir John Easthope (1784-1865), an MP who moved in with his wife, Elizabeth. The buildings are on a formal garden which is of Mediterranean design and is still with a lot of original features such as ornamental inscribed stones, a wide tree-lined avenue, walled garden and an ornamental pond.

The site has had many prominent owners including Richard MacGillivray Dawkins (1871-1955) who had the property in the years 1907-1955. Dawkins was a director of the British School at Athens where he carried out archaeological excavations at Sparta. He was a botanist too and introduced many Greek plants into the grounds which have been there for over one hundred years. Due to the many owners that Plas Dulas has had since its creation, it has been neglected and abused with unauthorised demolitions which have put the site in great risk of losing its historic significance. In recent years, a planning application (Ref: 0/36185) to demolish all buildings on the Plas Dulas site put the site at great risk and saw the objections of many different bodies including CPAT, Welsh Historic Gardens Preservation Trust and the Georgian Group. The application was rejected and the buildings are still in their sad condition. For example, the Roof has failed to prevent water damage

The grounds have lost 79 trees from its grounds as of the 15^th June 2009. Pleas were made to Cadw to list both the house and garden but it was turned down, and in February 2010 bulldozers took down the eighteenth-century barn and chapel, as well as the orchid house and park wall. Fortunately, the lesser horseshoe bat saved the main house. A conservation trust has been established for Llanddulas with a view to saving the site before it is too late.

Penrhos, Anglesey- Landscape at risk

 

Penrhos is an historic park and garden, which used to surround the mansion the Owen family. It passed into the hands of Sir John Thomas Stanley, who had married Margaret Owen in 1763 and remained with the Stanleys until just after WWII. Much of the Penrhos’s development was during the first decade of the 19^th century including buildings now listed at Grade II and the surrounding woodlands. During the 1960s, the main house was demolished.

 

Since 1972, 200 acres of Penrhos was opened as a nature reserve (the whole of which spans 600 acres!) by its current owner Anglesea Aluminium Metals Ltd. It is the third most popular site for tourists and is full of interesting wildlife and plant life, some of which were planted over 200 years ago. Penrhos is now at risk as its prospective purchaser, a company called Land & Lakes, have submitted a planning application to deforest a large portion of the nature reserve in order to build a  holiday park which will include 487 buildings, access roads, and footpaths. The plans will not only greatly disturb local wildlife, it will restrict public access to a large section of historic woodlands and will lose the integrity of this heritage asset. Penrhos represents great historic and eco-logical importance; it was even designated as a Regionally Important and Geomorphological Site in 2009 and also falls under Anglesey’s status as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB). This calls for the “the unique landscape, natural beauty and special qualities of the Isle of Anglesey AONB” to be “conserved and enhanced for the benefit of present and future generations”. Such a plan to destroy and build upon this land goes against its status and is not allowed.

 

At present, the plans for Penrhos are being processed and the decision will be made at the end of summer. Locals and people further afield have signed 3 petitions with over 3500 signatories and 60 or so letters of objection have been submitted the deadline for objection letters is the 26th June 2013. Anyone who wishes to write to the planning committee should do so before the deadline and include the title “Penrhos Coastal Park/Cae Glas/Kingsland Holyhead Planning Application” and quote the reference number “46C427K/TR//EIA/ECON”. Remember to check out Savepenrhos Reserve Facebook Page (https://www.facebook.com/savepenrhos.reserve) and Save PENRHOS Nature Reserve Holyhead (https://www.facebook.com/thepoetsofHolyIsland) for more info. Every letter helps!

St. Lukes, Abercarn

St Lukes is an abandoned grade II* listed church in Abercarn, Caerphilly, South Wales. The church is a very large and impressive building demonstrating a great example of modern architecture. This large church was designed by John Coates Carter (1859-1927), a famous Welsh architect during his later years around 1924-6 out of an unusual mix of local sandstone and reinforced concrete. Unfortunately, it was left to ruin in 1980 after prolonged issues with the roof and severe subsidence despite the building of a replacement roof in 1958 to counter these issues. St. Luke’s is of architectural significance because it demonstrates Carter’s “finest moment” and is “an important building in terms of UK Modernism”. It is a rare example Carter’s later works in which he broke away from historic themes and new building methods and modern style which now stands as a sad case of neglect. The damaged roof and the lack of windows, doors and water goods are putting the surrounding walls and floors in danger of deterioration despite their current strong condition. Evidence of criminal activity within the abandoned premises is now putting the local area and people at risk, clearly the restoration of this magnificent building will help revive the area and bring a much deserved sense of local heritage back.

The impressive looming tower still standing triumphantly

Detail of some of the vandalism at St. Lukes

Detail of water damage caused by the lack of Water-goods.