Pont Fawr (Big Bridge) was built in the 1630s and is often called “Inigo Jones’ Bridge” after the architect of such buildings as Banqueting House and St Paul’s Church, Covent Garden. I say is often called, because there’s not actually a lot of evidence to prove that Inigo Jones was involved at all, but there isn’t anything to say he wasn’t either. A plaque on the bridge claims that Jones designed it at the behest of Sir John Wynn of, you guessed it, Gwydir Castle.
I came across Gwydir Castle while browsing Conwy’s tourist page and immediately decided that it was somewhere I wanted to see. As already mentioned in the post about Llanrwst, the town is easy to get to by train and the castle is a pleasant roughly 20 minute walk from the station. It isn’t open every day so you really must check dates and times before you travel. Admission is currently £10 for adults.
Marking the boundary of the City of London these dragons are from the London Coal Exchange which was demolished in the 1960s. The Corporation of London’s street committee selected the statues as the model for the boundary markers in 1964 and replicas were erected at main entrances to the City.
Llanrwst is a small market town less than a mile from the edge of Snowdonia. My main purpose for visiting was to go to Gwydir Castle (which will feature in a later post) but I also had time to wander around the town. It was easy to get to from Llandudno Junction Railway Station (just across the bridge from Conwy) though there were at the time of writing only about four trains a day and only a couple that were actually helpful for my needs. Note there is a North Llanrwst Station and a Llanrwst – for the town and castle you’ll want Llanrwst (North Llanrwst is a request stop so if you do want to get off here make yourself known to the train staff). As you can see the railway station is one of the smallest I’ve been to.
St Mary’s Church is a lovely building right in the centre of Conwy, steps away from the castle and the B&B where I was staying. Before the castle existed the site of the church was the Cistercian Aberconwy Abbey dating from 1172 (Llywelyn the Great mentioned earlier was buried there in 1240). Henry III’s army would go on to ransack the abbey in 1245 and in 1283 Edward I would conquer the town and build his castle. The abbey site would become St Mary’s Church in 1284.
Nottingham has a great deal of green spaces many of which I’ve never actually visited, so this year I’ve decided to try and visit more of them. Arnot Hill Park was the first of these, which I picked solely because I happened to be roughly in the area on the day. It was easy to get to by bus – there’s a stop right outside the entrance on Nottingham Road.
St Mary’s is an Anglo-Catholic church that dates from the 12th century though its impressive looking tower and spire were added later in the 13th and 14th centuries. The tower is covered in blind arcading – those bits that look like windows – which means they are decorative and have no actual opening. We didn’t have chance to go inside on this visit, but were impressed by the beautiful exterior.
Christopher Wren died on 25 February 1723 so today marks the 300th anniversary of his death. The Georgian Group (which is a charitable organisation set up to preserve Georgian buildings that I only discovered existed this year) are spearheading a range of activities/lectures etc. about Christopher Wren for this anniversary throughout the year – you can find their events page here. One of my low key bucket list items is to visit every building connected with Wren and I’ve managed to tick off quite a few. St Paul’s Cathedral is of course one of them (though somewhat annoyingly when I visited – back in 2015 it turns out! – you couldn’t take pictures of the inside which is now permitted) but there are plenty of other interesting churches to visit, some of which are highlighted below.
Originally recognised for the design of at least 52 churches after the Great Fire of London it’s understood nowadays that many of those probably had much of the principal work, if not all, done by those who were working for Wren, such as Nicholas Hawksmoor, now a renowned architect in his own right. St-Mary-at-Hill is one of those churches that Wren restored after the fire and which was probably overseen by another architect, this time Robert Hooke.
I can’t quite remember how Penrhyn Castle came up in my research as things to do in North Wales but it ended up being my favourite destination. It’s one of those rare National Trust properties that’s easy to get to by public transport. Closer to Bangor than Conwy it’s a pleasant 40 minutes by bus from Conwy town centre (Arriva buses have a very handy app that worked well and an all day ticket covering North Wales cost me £6.50). The bus stop is right outside the entrance to the castle although there is then a gentle mile walk down the driveway to the ticket office and round to the castle itself.
Plas Mawr is an Elizabethan town house in the centre of Conwy. Welsh for “Great Hall” it was built around 1576. Maintained by Cadw, the historic environment service of the Welsh Government, it is free for Cadw members and due to reciprocal arrangements members of English Heritage (like myself), otherwise it is £8.50 for an adult ticket.
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