22663

 

II  

Designated  

04/11/1999  

04/11/1999  

Bron Elidir including surrounding wall and steps to Dinorwic Slate Quarry  

 

Gwynedd  

Llanddeiniolen  

Caernarfon  

Dinorwic  

259047  

360622  

 

Located in remote position at the end of a track running off the main track/road leading down from Dinorwic towards Llanberis; a curved flight of slate steps with retaining walls rises from the track giving access to the Dinorwic Slate Quarry.  

Domestic  

 

Probably built in the 1850s (it is not shown on the 1838 Tithe Map), there is a suggestion that before the opening of the Dinorwic Slate Company hospital above the shore of Llyn Padarn in 1876 this building may have served at least in part as a quarry hospital, after which date it appears to have been a quarry manager's house. The Dinorwic Quarry was first established in 1787, taking over existing workings in the area, the first incline being built in 1789. By the 1830s there was a tramway system on each terrace of the quarry, steam locomotives being introduced in the 1870s. The eventual scale of the quarry was such that its output of c100,000 tons p.a. in the late 1890s put in on a par with Penrhyn, representing almost a quarter of the total production of Welsh slate. The quarry finally closed in 1969.  

House is a 2-storey T-plan with entrance elevation on north-west. Rendered rubblestone with slate-hung gable ends to main range and further slate hanging to equal-height rear range; slate roofs. Entrance range is in 3 bays with unhorned 16-paned sashes on both floors and central flat-roofed porch with entablature and half-glazed outer door; steep-pitched gables over outer bays have slate coping and cusped bargeboards with pointed finials; integral end stacks with stepped capping are both slate hung. Similar end stack to rear range which has two 16-paned sashes on first floor and entrance to lower right in angle with main range. Large late C20 conservatory to right end of main range. Boundary wall is of dressed tightly jointed slate slabs, skilfully executed, with slab-on-edge coping forming crenellated parapet; slight projection in set-back section of wall opposite flight of steps to quarry has round-headed arch with pointed voussoirs, entablature and recessed nail-studded boarded door. The steps leading to the quarry are wide and of slate slab construction with curving retaining walls, also made of slate slabs.  

Interior not accessible at time of Survey.  

Included as a largely unaltered mid-C19 building of simple classical style built in the local materials and forming an important element in the C19 development of the Dinorwic Slate Quarry first as company hospital and later as quarry manager's house.