What's Notable About Port Talbot 5: Places of Worship

In the middle of the 20^th century, Port Talbot had an abundance of at least three types of buildings. It had an abundance of cinemas. Now there’s actually four cinema buildings left that I know of – The Regal in Taibach, which is now the Warehouse Gym, the Picturedrome which has been converted into residential properties, the Plaza which is currently being converted into a cultural hub and commercial and residential properties, and the Reel Cinema on Aberavon Beach. The Reel is a pretty typical example of out of town retail park architecture – perfectly inoffensive but with little to make the heart sing. Port Talbot also had an abundance of hotels and pubs. There’s still a lot of pubs, but when you think of what we lost in the 70s developments and later ones, you can see that we’re poorer off there than we were. Port Talbot, though, also had a lot of places of worship, and a lot of these are still there.

It’s maybe a little odd for me to write about places of worship as notable features of the town, since I don’t attend one, and my attitude to religion is probably best described as agnostic-haven’t-got-a clue-what’s-right. I’m honest enough to admit that I have nothing better to offer anyone else than what they already believe in, and I have respect for anyone who does sincerely follow any faith. But I’m interested in church and chapel architecture, and I think it does add to the appeal of a town or city.

Port Talbot can still boast a wealth of different styles of ecclesiastical architecture, as we’ll see. Still, one of the things which is fairly constant is the human scale of it. There’s very little in the area which I’d call shock and awe style church architecture. O let’s start off with one of the more bombastic – St. Theodore’s in Talbot Road.

The church, which is an example of the tail end of the Victorian Anglican Gothic revival, was consecrated in 1897, and built with financial assistance from Miss Emily Charlotte Talbot in memory of her brother Theodore – hence the dedication to Saint Theodore. It’s one of the largest churches in the town, and I think it shows some of the virtues of this particular style.

One of the sketches I sold to raise money for Oxfam is this sketch of St. Mary’s, close by the Bus station and shopping centre.

There’s been a church on this site since the end of the 12^th century, but the current building is just a little earlier than St. Theodore’s, dating from 1859, although the tower was built a little over 10 years earlier. This too is built in a gothic revival style, but while St. Theodore is like a miniature cathedral, this owes more to a country church, and is none the worse for it. I particularly like the churchyard around the church, and I tried to bring this out in the sketch.

I did say that there’s a variety of styles you can see in Port Talbot, didn’t I? 

This is Margam Abbey Parish Church. Margam Park stands on the site of a former 12^th century Cistercian Abbey. You can still see the ruins of the Chapter House in the Park.

The current Abbey Parish Church was built on the nave of the old Abbey Church. I’m not sure when it was put into its current form, but I really like the Italianate design of the façade now.

Since we’re talking about variety – how about this?

St. Peter’s is the only public building of any kind in Goytre. Goytre is a small community about a mile inland from the centre of Port Talbot. For another thing it was actually moved from where it stood previously in Morfa, when our old friend Miss Emily Talbot paid to have it re-erected in Goytre, concerned that there was no place of worship in Goytre itself. The main reason, though, is that the walls of the church are constructed from galvanised metal, which somehow seems remarkably appropriate, bearing in mind the importance of the steel industry to the development of the town. The church, opened on this site in 1915, was renovated in the early years of the 21st century, and reopened in 2003. When I made this sketch it was looking a bit tatty and a bit sorry for itself.

If you’re not all churched out yet, have a look at this

The darker brown building is St. Joseph’s Roman Catholic Church. It’s a striking building, and all the more striking in as much as it was built in 1930. You can see that it owes a little to church architecture of earlier decades. I particularly like the tower – that small roof on it makes it work for me, as does the little bit of ornamentation underneath the roof. I believe that it was built largely through the efforts of Port Talbot’s Roman Catholic community, including my wife’s grandparents.

This is St. Catherine’s in Baglan, and it’s the first successful sketch I made using an ink pen. For me, St. Catherine’s is a rather lovely building, not least because it has the best spire in Port Talbot (alright, just my opinion, feel free to disagree)

I’ve no doubt it’s not that remarkable when you compare it to other churches up and down the length and breadth of the country, but I like its unfussy quality, and the fact that it has the air of a simple country church despite being situated so close to the M4 Motorway.

I’ll single out just a couple more ‘still in use’ churches, as opposed to chapels. Way up in the Afan Valley, but still within the Borough of Neath and Port Talbot, is the village of Glyncorrwg. Glyncorrwg is the home of the rather lovely, and very striking little church of St. John. I have no dea when it was constructed and haven’t been able to find out, but I like it. This was recommended to me by a friend and fellow member of the Afan Nedd Artists’ Group who knows I love buildings, and interesting churches. I sketched it on a wet and miserable summer’s day, and it still looked this striking and interesting. I’m intrigued by the steepness of the roof considering how small the walls are, and I really like the unique bell tower.

Before we move onto churches that now serve different purposes, I’d like to to show you one of the more modern churches in the town. 

This is Sandfields Methodist Church. As you can see from the picture, it’s currently undergoing some renovation. At the apex of the roof it used to have a row of asymmetric crosses, which I rather liked, but they seem to have been removed. Now, when I tell you that the church dates from the end of the 1950s and the beginning of the 1960s, you’re maybe expecting a tirade from me. Well, actually, I don’t think it’s a beautiful church. But I think it’s an interesting one. The geometric designs – the fact that a whole side of the church is all roof, mark it out as a child of its era. But at least it’s sincere. It’s not half hearted. Of course, it’s concrete, and does show some rather ugly typical concrete weathering on the slabby side of the building. But still, I do like this building, and I’d be sad to see it go.

There’s a couple of fine church buildings that are still standing, but no longer in use as churches. Let’s start with Holy Cross Church. 

Holy Cross is on a little rise, very close to the Motorway. Like St. Mary’s, I think the best views of it are through the churchyard, like this one. I believe that the building is currently home to an undertaker’s – somehow grimly appropriate, that.

This next former church was an unexpected discovery during a sketching expedition in Pontrhydyfen. This used to be the church of St. John, Pontrhydyfen, and it’s been converted into a rather lovely looking residential building. Let’s be honest, if the church had been demolished and an ordinary residential building been put up in its place, could you see a passer by ever stopping to make a sketch of it like this? Well, put it this way – if someone had, it wouldn’t have been me.

This is St. Paul’s Aberavon. I don’t know that the building itself is currently being used for anything, but in the church grounds is the St. Paul’s Centre, which is a very fine resource for the people of Aberavon. I hope that the church building itself will stay. Yes if you look at the sketch, the rear of the building, on the left, is rather unremarkable. But look at that curved and rounded front end. It’s slightly reminiscent of some of the more elegant buildings from the Conquest period in Normandy. Sorry – I’m going up myself a little there. Let’s calm down a bit.

If Port Talbot is not short on churches, then it’s certainly not short on chapels either. Which is what you’d expect, to be honest. The non-conformist tradition has always been strong in Wales, and Port Talbot is typical in the number of chapels still standing here. Let’s begin with one of my absolute favorites. 

This is the Beulah Calvinistic Methodist Chapel – commonly known as the Round Chapel. It’s actually not round at all. It is in fact octagonal. It was one building which really grabbed my attention when I first moved to Port Talbot in 1986, partly because of its unusual appearance, and even more so because it inhabits a quiet corner of a small park, minding its own business as it there’s nothing unusual about it at all.

The  chapel was constructed as part of the "planned village" of Groes, created by architect Edward Haycock, Sr. It was built by Thomas Jenkin in 1838 at the cost of £800. In 1974, the government inn their wisdom decided to demolish the village to make room for the new M4 motorway. The chapel was the only building in the village to be saved; it was re-located in 1975–76 to Margam, in an area called Tollgate Park. It was Grade II*-listed as early as 1976 as the only surviving octagonal chapel in Wales.

One of my worst early sketches – which you can see below, is the Ebenezer Chapel.

I think we should celebrate the Ebenezer Chapel because it’s the only building from this particular part of the centre of the town to have survived the redevelopment of the 1970s. Sited to one side of the Civic Centre, it’s one of those buildings you see all the time when you go into town to the shopping centre, and it’s very easy to ignore it and be blasé about it. Yet it’s a building which rewards anyone who stops to take a close look at it. There’s a lot of intricate work on the façade. I also like the almost Romanesque windows. Built in 1881, the chapel was grade II listed in 1980.

I didn’t get the perspective right when I made this sketch of the Gibeon Chapel behind the main road in Taibach, hence it looks as if it’s drunkenly leaning over.

This building replaced the mid 19^th century building in about 1910. It’s nice that it’s still in use as a chapel too, since most of the rest of chapels we’re going to look at are not in use any more.

So we come to the Dyffryn Chapel, in Ffrwdwyllt St. I don’t know if you get the scale of it from my line and wash sketch below, but this is a big impressive building – and that’s when it’s been out of use for a long time. It raises the question in my mind exactly why it was built here, in a quiet side street. 

The original building was put up in the 1840s, but the chapel’s current appearance dates from 1893. I don’t know when the chapel fell out of use, but I do know that it has had a bit of  a chequered history since. I know that there were plans for conversion into residential properties which didn’t come to fruition, although I’m not sure why. It’s a shame. It’s a lovely building, and surely that space could be put to good use. I’m not critiising the council in this – in my last post I showed that the council have been forward looking and ambitious in their recent attitude to buildings of note. Still, maybe at some time in the future?

Probably the most prominent disused chapel in Port Talbot is the Bethany Chapel on Bethany Square in the town centre. The foundation stone was laid in 1879. It’s been difficult to find out when it stopped being used as a chapel. One website I found said it was around 2000, however I myself distinctly remember going into it in about 1990 when it was the temporary town central library. After the library moved out, it’s been disused since, for the best part of 2 decades, I would guess. It was listed for public auction in the summer of 2019, but I don’t know if it was sold or not. At the moment it remains empty. I hope that eventually it will be redeveloped and used, without being demolished completely. It’s not as fancy or ornate as nearby Ebenezer Chapel, but it’s very position, on the corner of the square, slightly elevated above the roadway level and accessible by steps, make it an imposing building.

If you follow the road round from Bethany Chapel into Forge Road, you can see the last building I’m going to write about in this post. This is the Tabernacl Newydd, built in 1909. 

I believe the chapel was still in use at the turn of the Milennium. However it has been ut n the market at least once since, so I don’t believe that it is still in use. I have mixed feelings about this building. It certainly isn’t pretty. It’s unusual to see a Welsh chapel built in such a Gothic style. It’s dark and I find it a little threatening. But it is a building that you can’t ignore, and I’d hate to see it gone.