Thanks to UEP-Wales for bringing this one to my attention in perfect time for a little South Wales trip.
Tabor Welsh Congregational Chapel, latterly part of the United Reformed Church, was first constructed in 1829, rebuilt in 1856 and this, the chapel as it stands today, was built in 1876 by Thomas Thomas of Landore. Built in the Classical style with a gable entry plan, a two-storey layout and large arch in the facade. It features a Glorification arch, an unmolested interior and unusual ironwork inside and as such is considered one of his finest works, so is now Grade II listed. The chapel closed in 2003 and in the intervening years at some point came to house the entire contents of a Billy Bear children's soft play centre. The attached Sunday School building is almost totally buried under the stuff however mercifully there is a lot less inside the chapel.
After gaining entry with a bit of lateral thinking we were initially struck by how terrible a condition the Sunday School is in. The ceiling has caved in across the rear half of it making the balcony very unstable and indeed one corner with one of the staircases has totally rotted through. After carefully getting down to the ground floor level we found that that floor was no better, in most of the room it's basically just carpet and beams. Thankfully though, after pulling open the door into the chapel itself I was faced with the reason I had put this one on my 'to do' list. The interior of the chapel is stunning, despite the plethora of crap being stored in there. It has held up fairly well in the years since closure however the damage from neglect is beginning to show, the large arched window at the far end has separated from the wall and fallen inwards, and there are holes appearing in the ceiling. We spent far longer here than expected, it was a great peaceful place to sit and shoot, although there are literally thousands of cobwebs in here over pretty much everything so perhaps not a place to be if you have a fear of spiders...
The scaffolding on two areas of the outside appears brand new, so hopefully they are about to do something with it whether that's just patching the roof up or more I don't know.
...And then we pulled the door open.
Thanks for looking
Tabor Welsh Congregational Chapel, latterly part of the United Reformed Church, was first constructed in 1829, rebuilt in 1856 and this, the chapel as it stands today, was built in 1876 by Thomas Thomas of Landore. Built in the Classical style with a gable entry plan, a two-storey layout and large arch in the facade. It features a Glorification arch, an unmolested interior and unusual ironwork inside and as such is considered one of his finest works, so is now Grade II listed. The chapel closed in 2003 and in the intervening years at some point came to house the entire contents of a Billy Bear children's soft play centre. The attached Sunday School building is almost totally buried under the stuff however mercifully there is a lot less inside the chapel.
After gaining entry with a bit of lateral thinking we were initially struck by how terrible a condition the Sunday School is in. The ceiling has caved in across the rear half of it making the balcony very unstable and indeed one corner with one of the staircases has totally rotted through. After carefully getting down to the ground floor level we found that that floor was no better, in most of the room it's basically just carpet and beams. Thankfully though, after pulling open the door into the chapel itself I was faced with the reason I had put this one on my 'to do' list. The interior of the chapel is stunning, despite the plethora of crap being stored in there. It has held up fairly well in the years since closure however the damage from neglect is beginning to show, the large arched window at the far end has separated from the wall and fallen inwards, and there are holes appearing in the ceiling. We spent far longer here than expected, it was a great peaceful place to sit and shoot, although there are literally thousands of cobwebs in here over pretty much everything so perhaps not a place to be if you have a fear of spiders...
The scaffolding on two areas of the outside appears brand new, so hopefully they are about to do something with it whether that's just patching the roof up or more I don't know.
...And then we pulled the door open.
Thanks for looking
