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Situated within the medieval walled town of Conwy, Plas Mawr (the ‘Great Hall’) is often described as the best preserved Elizabethan town house in the country. The house was built between 1576 and 1585 for successful merchant Robert Wynn, the third son of a prominent local landowner. At the age of 50 Wynn married Dorothy Griffith. The decorative plasterwork in the house incorporated heraldic emblems of the families to whom both Robert and Dorothy were related. Dorothy died in 1586. Robert later remarried and the house became home to his seven children.

Later on the house was sub-divided into tenements. Tenants included a dairyman, a saddler, a washerwoman and a joiner. Two rooms on the first floor were used as a school and a court sat in the gatehouse which fronts on to High Street. For a century from 1887 the house was leased by the Royal Cambrian Academy of Art by the owner Lord Mostyn.

By the 1990s Plas Mawr was in serious need of structural repair. The RCA moved to newly converted premises nearby and the house was placed in the care of Cadw. Between 1993 and 1997 Cadw carried out a comprehensive programme of restoration, including repairing timbers, re-slating the roof, re-rendering the walls and conserving and repainting the elaborate plaster decoration. The house was re-furnished, based on an inventory of the contents taken in 1665. The gardens have also been recreated, although these were originally more extensive. The house is reputedly haunted.

Source: Coflein Link


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