Christmas at Tredegar House

The Edney Gates, Tredegar House.

I have been wanting to do the tour of Tredegar House at Christmas for some while, but for one reason or another I could not seem to instill any great interest in any of my friends. I did it eighteen years ago and the memory has stayed with me.

Saturday night a friend rang and said she was going with her sister on Sunday and would I like to go, so I jumped at it. I invited another friend and we all met up. Sadly it was much more commercialised than previously and as this was a daytime visit there were lots of disinterested children on the tour, but nevertheless it was well worth the effort.

The 'Friends of Tredegar House', dressed in period costume, were very knowledgeable on the history of the place, which makes all the difference, and that combined with what I already knew made it interesting.

Tredegar House is largely a creation of the late 17th century: between 1664 - 1672 it was rebuilt when a sequence of state rooms was incorporated into the building. At this time the estate was some 1,000 acres of which 90 acres remain to this day. All this I learned yesterday. What I did know was that the Lords of Tredegar are no more, the last one dying in 1962 and the estate was long sold off at that time and all that was left was the title.

The house was sold and it's contents dispersed in 1952 and for 23 years it was a school. I asked how much damage had been done when it was a school and the reply was 'surprisingly little'. The then Newport Borough Council took it over in 1974 and began restoring and refurbishing the property, and buying back the artefact's from all over the world with the help of the fundraising efforts of 'Friends of Tredegar House'.

The house is famous for the Edney Gates, (see photograph above - taken through a closed window yesterday) They were made and erected between 1714 and 1718 for John Morgan, the then owner of Tredegar House, they are an exceptional example of early 18th century decorative wrought ironwork and made by the Edney brothers, gatesmiths of Bristol. These are the only known example of their work this side of the Bristol Channel.

The Lord Mayor of Newport was being shown around yesterday, so we were following in his wake ...which was amusing! So, a good informative day. We finished the tour with Carols, mince pies and mulled wine. There were also lots of stalls in the forecourt where my companions did some Christmas shopping.

One friend asked me how it compared to eighteen years ago. I was unable to answer honestly. Eighteen years ago I went with my former husband and we had just bought a house and were planning to get married ...different circumstances altogether! Back then I could never have predicted my circumstance of today.