From the castle it is time to explore the small town for a while as we make our way towards Plas Mawr Mansion. It has quite a few beautiful buildings but the one we are looking for is a special one and it is near the water side.
And it is the Smallest House in Britain, at least according to the advertising. It was built in the 16th century and remained in use until 1900 when it was declared unfit for human habitation. It is small, true, but the last inhabitant was a 1.91m fisherman so it was livable in, barely.
Ad then we walk directly to Plas Mawr, which is included in our CADW Pass, so why not visit it? Plas Mawr or Great Hall is considered to be the finest surviving Elizabethan town house anywhere in Britain. It is a bit difficult to find as the house’s main frontage is discreetly hidden away in a steep narrow lane.
The High Street gatehouse that we enter through only hints at the grandeur within – there are a series of terraces that ywe can climb to explore 17 impressive rooms. We are actually quite surprised when we look at the map and understand how much we have to visit so on we go with the first room already being really impressive.
This is a restored mansion that we like to visit. Each room is decorated to match the epoch that the house was used and just by entering we usually have a good idea what it was. We can see the dining room and the kitchen and based on the food stuff shown you can already guess that the owner was quite wealthy.
The rooms have beautiful plasterwork and we really enjoy all the detail throughout. A repeated detail are the initials of the owner – he was certainly not shy of proclaiming his wealth and ownership.
Next are the bedrooms which are exactly as you would expect a medieval bedroom of a rich city dweller to look like. We really marvel at how women at the time were walking around in the difficult to put on and take off (and really do any movement in) clothes.
Next we exit into the gardens. They are quite extensive given how small the house lot looked from the outside. It is also a place to enjoy the rare Welsh sun and take a break on the benches strategically placed throughout.
From the garden we also have the best view of the fortress like mansion. While mostly unassuming from outside, from the garden it looks like we are in a small castle, a nice bit of architectural trickery.
After exploring the attic we then arrive to the most famous room of the mansion, for obvious reasons. It was done even then to start the conversations and I assume it worked then, as it certainly works now.
One of the best views from the mansion is from a tower top. The views are great in all directions especially towards the castle. We kow understand that we have seen the mansion previously from the castle but didn’t know what it was, now everything snaps into place and we understand better the layout of the city, right when we are about to leave.
On the way back to the parking lot we take one more look at the impressive walls where we spent half of our day and then it is time to move on south towards the last castle of the major four built by Edward I.
