Plas Dulas, Llanddulas - February 2011

[The Littlest Jellyfish]

Jellyfish Industries Ltd: crawling through wrecked mansions so you don't have to, since 2010.

Plas Dulas is currently the subject of fierce debate in Conwy County. The evil developer that owns it wants to bulldoze the whole thing and build 29 new homes on the land. Locals, plus a whole load of heritage organisations, want the place saved. Cadw (pronounced ca-doo), the Welsh Heritage authority responsible for granting listing status to buildings in Wales, have just declined to list the building because it's in poor repair. The evil developer has already had a number of planning applications rejected, but last year went ahead and started bulldozing it anyway, flattening the chapel and coach house before he was forcibly stopped by the council. He's just submitted another application, this time for 15 homes (rather than 29). Objections to the current planning application are to be received by 17th February, but to be honest I've got a bad feeling that this place isn't going to last much longer.

The following bit of history is copied from various places online. A search for 'Plas Dulas' will turn up a load of news articles about the current planning fuss.

Although a building was erected on the land in the late 18th century, what's currently there dates from the early 19th century. Previous occupants were Sir John Easthope, owner of the Morning Chronicle (one of the biggest Victorian newspapers. Charles Dickens as a staff writer), and later Professor Richard MacGillivray Dawkins, a famous archaeologist and director of the British School in Athens. He was great friends with author Evelyn Waugh who visited Plas Dulas many times and wrote his book Decline and Fall there. After he died in the 1950s, the house was bought by an Hungarian lady. She was a Christian missionary and used Plas Dulas as a Christian retreat. When she died in the late 1990s the house had fallen into a poor state because she was quite elderly and couldn't look after it properly. She died intestate, so there was a big hunt to find her heirs. In the meantime, a young couple from Rhyl moved in and tried to exert squatters' rights. They planned to restore the house as a community centre. They began to fix the roof and the windows, but were evicted when some distant relatives were found. The house was sold and it's now in the hands of the evil developer.

This was a bittersweet visit, because although it's a potentially stunning place, it's so absolutely wrecked inside that in some of these photos it won't be obvious what you're actually looking at. Even so, although the roof and insides are a write-off, the shell is structurally sound, and it'd make a great conversion.

I apologise in advance for the quality of some of these photos, but I'm putting them up anyway so that when this place is replaced by a bunch of cheap flimsy shitholes that last 15 years before having to be knocked down, and your grandchildren ask you whether you ever got to see inside the old mansion that was on the land before, you can say 'well, little Beyonce and little Kanye, I never got to go inside personally, but an internet acquaintance of mine saved me the bother. And thank heavens for that, because judging by the photos I saw it would have been a complete waste of time going there'.











Looking up. The upper floors got tired of being upper floors, and are now hanging around in piles on the ground floor. The dark blue bits visible in between the roof joists are known as 'the sky'. You may recognise them from last time you were outside at night:











This is a bath. It is full of nice hot soapy water. In the olden days, you would sit in here and maybe read a book, sip a glass of wine and when you emerged an hour later, you would be clean and smell nice:





These are old light fittings in what used to be the ceiling, from back when electricity used to flow through wires. They don't work any more:



Top Tip: when you run out of fibre glass insulation, you can lag your floors and ceilings with old clothes, rolled up newspaper and plastic carrier bags. This will reduce your energy bills by up to 22%:









Looking up to what would have been the second floor. These doorways are now only accessible to flighted birds, bacteria or people with sturdy ladders:







And finally back outside:

[MJS]

Looks like a cracking little spot this

[georgie]

good stuff i didnt know it was this bad inside

[Nicola]

I bet that place was gorgeous in it's hey day - what a shame it has been let to rot. Great pics

[simonix]

What a beautiful place, shame its crumbling away!

[astro23]

What a stunning building! Would be a real crime to bulldoze it! defiantly not a waste of time going there!

[BB]

Great report
Love the look of this place

[minxy*]

Looks a great mooch

[Only2Eyes]

Oooof she's in a bad way. Nicely done mate.

[ERNIE99_UK]

the security signs amusing, rewards for trespassers caught hehe- trespassing isnt criminal so you could have some fun with that!