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Tuesday, 22-May-2012 10:21:53 BST
Architectural Town Walk
Seion Chapel, built in 1876-8 with a basement schoolroom
Seion Chapel
Seion Chapel, built in 1876-8 with a basement schoolroom, was the fifth 19th-century chapel for Aberystwyth's Independent cause. The 1823 long-wall chapel building survives in Vulcan Street. By the 1870s this was too small: four houses were purchased in Baker Street in 1875. Richard Owen was appointed as architect; this was his third Aberystwyth chapel. The architecture is Italianate: the window tracery is of ca. 1500 Venetian style and, inside, there is an arcaded and loggia-like gallery; the Sedd Fawr is almost identical to that in Salem, Caernarfon, contemporary and also by Owen. The organ is of 1903, by Norman & Beard, and the organ chamber of post-1928. This chapel is effectively built across the town ditch as can be seen by the higher level to the rear. The ground here may have caused stability problems; if you look carefully you will note that the face and the pediments are not quite vertical, perhaps a deliberate ploy to counteract the problem. Inside the high arcade carried from the ground floor through the gallery to the ceiling may be an engineering attempt to bind the outside walls.
Bethel, Welsh Baptist Church, the third on this site, which was opened in 1889
Uphill from it and on the opposite side is Bethel, Welsh Baptist Church, the third on this site, which was opened in 1889. The Welsh Baptist cause in Aberystwyth had begun in 1766 in the form of preaching services by ministers from south Wales travelling for the North Wales Baptist Mission. The first chapel, opened in 1797, was apparently the first structure outside the town walls here. Thomas E. Morgan (see above and below for Post Office and WH Smith) designed the present chapel, which replaced the earlier long-wall structures. Please note some polychromy and an abundance of carving in Grinshill stone on a front of hammer-dressed Llanddewi Brefi blue stone, described in detail in The Aberystwyth Observer, the symbols of the Sacrament in the north-west porch gable, and oak leaves 'of Gothic treatment' on the other porch. Inside, Godwin's vestibule tiles, the chapel ceiling, gallery front and other features are as referred to in 1889.
It has been suggested that the design was loosely based on that for Owen's Tabernacle in Powell Street - in the opinion of many it is an improvement. This chapel has been called the epitome of the Welsh nonconformist chapel; it is certainly a magnificent example of the genre.
Opposite Bethel Chapel is Victoria House, formerly the Victoria Tavern, now the Treehouse, with the statue of Queen Victoria recently restored and reinstated in its corner bay. The statue is probably a former ship's figurehead, but the vessel from which it came has not been identified.
English Baptist Church of 1869-70, again by Richard Owen
The Public Library closes the vista up Alfred Place, but on the way to it is the English Baptist Church of 1869-70, again by Richard Owen, with conventional round-arched windows, varied with a dose of Gothic, with big centre wheel window, and with gabled hoods over the outer windows. The Public Library in Corporation Street was a Carnegie foundation and was built in 1905-6 by Walter G. Payton of London in an attractive free 17th-century classical style, the external walls faced with local brown stone rubble, with red sandstone dressings. There is a period interior with green glazed tiles.
The Public Library in Corporation Street was a Carnegie foundation and was built in 1905-6
Right into Lower Eastgate
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