Mention Wales to anyone and they are bound to think of rugby teams, the Fron choir, Snowdonia and the International Eisteddfod. Rarely though will one think of historic architecture, landscapes, parks and gardens. Yet for those who are interested in the subject, the country is peppered with a surprising richness of heritage property often of vernacular origin. Whilst you will not find a Blenheim or Chatsworth in Wales, you will find houses and gardens that are not one whit less inspiring, frequently set in breathtaking surroundings. Sadly though, a large portion of these properties have been forgotten and abandoned for decades, thus now providing exceptional opportunities for those in search of their own paradise in the United Kingdom. In this book the authors succeed in bringing the issue of heritage at risk into the public domain with informed humour when looking at renovation possibilities the length and breadth of the Principality. They have as a result discovered what should become in due course some of the most delightful homes to be found anywhere. Not only is the book intended to whet the appetite of any discerning family in search of a spectacular home of high amenity but also to assist in demystifying the rescue process. Much sage advice is given as to how to acquire and rescue heritage items that are now in distress. In addition, and by way of encouragement they mention some fascinating examples of success stories. Some readers will no doubt try to turn dreams into reality, whilst others will turn reality into dreams, and that is always how it has been...

Review

This book is a disgrace and should never have been written. Congratulations therefore to the authors for bringing an ongoing scandal to our attention. How can it be that in the last thirty years of rising house prices (excluding odd blips) and when historic properties command extra premium, so many fine buildings of architectural distinction and cultural value have been left to rot in Welsh town and countryside, apparently not noticed, not cared about, clearly not on the market and not (so far as one can glean) causing sleepless nights to local authorities who are the front line protectors of their area s heritage? Is it not a scar on the conscience of a nation that professes to care for its past? More pragmatically, with housing shortages as a recurrent theme in the press, running parallel to protest against the grubbing up of green fields, why is so much potentially good housing, in enviable settings (much of it divisible into manageable units) allowed to crumble? Here too could be hotels, offices, family businesses, employing, earning, paying, revitalising small communities. But silence: the years roll by, the slates slip, the vandals strip and something of value to both the past and future has gone. Yes, there are ownership problems, legal disputes and all manner of obstacles but watching money go down the drain is never rewarding. So why? This book is not a pretty sight. How can our political leaders trumpet national pride when a stone s throw from the Senedd is the imperious but rotting Coal Exchange and the weed-waving Cardiff Bay Railway Station? No signs of regeneration here in their front yard. The Coal Exchange was the greatest wealth-producing building ever built in Wales, where the black gold hacked out by the miners became the cash gold that fed the country and made Wales proud of herself. It seems small beer to mention that the building was also designed by Edwin Seward, one of Wales s greatest architects. Certainly this volume is not a catalogue of anglophile Victorian monsters landed on Welsh soil by extractive English industrialists. Yes, there are one or two, but can we not be as proud of a great design by the world famous Gilbert Scott in Denbighshire as we are of the Monets in the National Museum? Apparently not: Scott s fine mansion at Hafodunos, with plaster reliefs by John Gibson, that peerless sculptor from Conwy, is now a part-tumbled ruin, having been allowed to pass from one unrealistic would-be developer to the next, until some boys with a match lit up the night sky and a grade I listed building, which no-one in authority seems to have made any effort to protect despite the quiverful of legal powers at their disposal, went to hell. Here rather are homes big and small, churches, follies, stables, of all sorts and all ages and all part of our heritage. The authors style is surprisingly cheerful and hopeful; their Introduction explains how to go about saving a ruin. Some entries look too eye-popping and costly ever to be saved, until one reads that the most impossible-looking of all, Gwrych Castle at Abergele, has been purchased for a wonderful hotel conversion, thanks to the dogged persistence of Mark Baker, one of the authors, over a decade of determination. Michael Tree his colleague, has already saved two lovely houses, mostly through his own hard labour. You will be moved by this book; hopefully moved into action. --Thomas Lloyd, Cambria Magazine October 2008

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