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St Fagans Castle

The Architectural and Social History of a Welsh Country House

Author(s) Bethan Scorey

Hardback - £25.00

Language: English

Genre(s): History

November 2026 · 272 pages ·234x156mm

· Hardback - 9781837724147
· eBook - pdf - 9781837724154
· eBook - epub - 9781837724161

About the Book
Contents
About the Author(s)

This is the first comprehensive study of St Fagans Castle, an Elizabethan country house in Cardiff which is of twofold significance as a Grade I-listed building, and home to St Fagans National Museum of History since 1948. The house was built by a local lawyer named Dr John Gibbon in about 1580, and was one of the first symmetrical country houses in Wales influenced by the Italian Renaissance. This study takes a multi-period and cross-disciplinary approach to telling the story of St Fagans, with chapters spanning the twelfth to the twentieth century, and interrelated sections on architectural history, garden history and ownership. Key themes explored in the work include the impact of the Italian Renaissance on country houses in Wales; the architectural distinction of country houses in Wales, especially in comparison with English country houses; the contribution of women to architectural and garden developments at St Fagans; and the colonial connection at St Fagans.

Acknowledgements
List of Illustrations
List of Abbreviations
Genealogies
Floor Plans
Maps of Grounds
Introduction
Chapter 1:
‘A Faire Howse Within the Old Walls of a Castle’
The Early History of St Fagans Castle to 1736
Medieval St Fagans
Dr John Gibbon
Arrival of Renaissance Architecture in England and Wales
Design of St Fagans Castle
Lewis Family of Y Fan
Elizabethan and Jacobean Gardens
Chapter 2:
‘This ancient Castle of your ancestors’
The Windsor family and St Fagans Castle, 1736–1878
Windsor Family as Absentee Landlords
Taking St Fagans Castle in Hand
Robert Windsor-Clive’s Watercolour Proposal
William Parry James and the 1867–9 Scheme
Harriet Windsor-Clive and the ‘Gothicising’ of St Fagans Castle
Mary Windsor-Clive and her ‘Wild’ Additions to the Gardens
Chapter 3:
‘Enchanted land of Arthurian romance’
Robert George and Gay Windsor-Clive and St Fagans Castle, 1878–1923
Introducing Robert and Gay Windsor-Clive
The New House at Hewell Grange
St Fagans Castle as a Foil to Hewell Grange
Edwardian ‘Garden Rooms’
Enclosed Park
Hugh A. Pettigrew’s Contribution to the Gardens
The Next Generation
Bibliography

Author(s): Bethan Scorey

Dr Bethan Scorey is an architectural historian and illustrator from Cardiff. She first discovered her passion for historic buildings while working as a guide at St Fagans National Museum of History, an open-air museum filled with buildings – from an Iron Age roundhouse to a 1940s prefab. The subject of her PhD was St Fagans Castle, the Elizabethan country house at the heart of the museum. Today, you can find Bethan co-presenting the S4C television programme Cartrefi Cymru, which explores the history and evolution of houses in Wales. She loves nothing more than setting out on adventure to find an historic building.