World Architecture Day
It’s World Architecture Day and we’re celebrating great Welsh buildings and design – from humble vernacular structures, to polite Georgian villas and High Victorian Gothic, to the many wonderful Art Deco and the International Modern style buildings thriving today across Wales. Here are 12 of our favourites:
1. The Big Apple, Mumbles (NPRN 801124). Built in the 1930s by the Cidatone company, who designed and erected several kiosks across South Wales and the south coast of England emblazoned with the slogan ‘Drink your apple a day!’ as part of a marketing campaign. Made of reinforced concrete, the Big Apple is Grade II listed as the only surviving example of these quirky structures – and now in use as an ice cream hut.
2. St Tanwg’s Church, near Harlech in Gwynedd (NPRN 43901), sits in the sand dunes on the foreshore some 20 metres from the high-water mark. Small, single-cell, probably 13th century in origin, it houses rare 5th– and 6th-century inscribed stones and like hundreds of simple vernacular stone churches across Wales just seems to have grown out of the land, with the churchyard now largely reclaimed by the sand.
3. Former Moranedd Café, Criccieth, Gwynedd (NPRN 401329). A fabulous beachside pavilion and café by one of Wales finest architects, Clough Williams-Ellis, in the International Modern style. Designed c.1948, Moranedd curves around the eastern end of the Esplanade, with two projecting wings set in a ‘boomerang’ shape, rendered block walls with steel and glass-block windows and a bold overhanging flat roof.
4. Castell Coch, near Cardiff (NPRN 93112). A fairytale French-style Gothic Revival castle with 3 tall circular towers and a glittering High Victorian interior by William Burgess based on archaeological assessment and excavation of the castle remains on the site, using medieval illuminated manuscripts for inspiration. Designed for ‘occasional occupation in the summer’ by the 3rd Marquess of Bute and little-used; now in the care of Cadw and open to all.
5. Odeon Cinema, Newport (NPRN 603). Designed by Arthur Price in 1938 in a Modernist 1930s ‘Odeon’ style with Art Deco influences. Red-brown and brown brickwork with channelling and extensive buff and black faience work. In use as a cinema until 1981, later converted into a live music venue, bingo hall, and then Newport City Church.
6. Llanerchaeron, Ceredigion (NPRN 3024). A refined villa of 1794 in the Aeron valley by John Nash. His most complete surviving work in Wales and a rare example of a self-sufficient eighteenth-century estate with home farm – now in the care of National Trust Cymru. The service courtyard includes a dairy with original slate-made cheese presses and cream pans, a laundry, brewery and salting house, and walled kitchen gardens.
7. Senedd Cymru Welsh Parliament, Cardiff (NPRN 403909). A pioneering environmentally sensitive building by the Richard Rogers Partnership, opened in 2006 and housing the debating chamber and supporting offices of the National Assembly for Wales. It has a suspended timber-clad roof over glass-walled chambers and offices designed to represent the transparency of government in Wales. Awarded a BREEAM ‘excellent’ rating for its sustainable design and shortlisted for the Stirling prize.
8. Wesleyan Chapel, Crescent Road, Caerphilly (NPRN 14336). A wonderful and little-known inter-war chapel of 1930 in a pared-back Art Deco / International Modern style in Beaufort multi-coloured bricks with stone dressings. Seating 450 and accommodating a large school underneath. Architect: Phillips & Wride of Cardiff; listed Grade II.
9. Aberystwyth Arts Centre (NPRN 23264) designed by Dale Owen of Percy Thomas Partnership, and completed in 1970-1972, to a Brutalist block design using grey granite aggregate, with panoramic views over the main piazza style concourse with bell tower and the sea beyond. Redeveloped by Peter Roberts in 1998 and Thomas Heatherwick in 2009. The Great Hall has recently been listed Grade II* and the Bell Tower Grade II.
10. Tabernacle Independent Chapel, Coleman Terrace, Llanelli (NPRN 6429). Grade II* listed and the jewel in Llanelli’s grand Victorian townscape – Tabernacle was built in 1872-3 by John Humphreys of Morriston in brown rubble stone with Bath stone dressings, a monumental Corinthian three-bay central arcade, and has a fabulous unaltered interior.
11. Our Lady Star of the Sea, Amlwch (NPRN 43588). No Top Twelve list of great Welsh architecture would be complete without including one of Anglesey’s most iconic buildings. Erected in 1937 using reinforced concrete – its roof resembling the hull of a boat, with ‘port-hole’ windows. Designed by G Rinvolucri, an Italian architect, and dedicated to sailors lost at sea.
12. Town Hall, Portmeirion (NPRN 407060). The largest building in the centre of this famous Italianate coastal village. Erected 1937-1938 in a romantic Arts & Crafts style rescuing and reusing fabric from Emral Hall, Flintshire, including dressed and carved stonework and the famous ‘Hercules Hall’, an early-17th-century Great Chamber with fine vaulted plasterwork ceiling and panelling, bought by Williams-Ellis at auction shortly before the house’s demolition.
06/10/2025