Criccieth - Culture

Culture

Criccieth is a predominantly Welsh speaking community, 65.54 per cent of the population speaking the language.

The Memorial Hall, fronting Y Maes, is a venue for concerts, dramas and other community events and the main venue during the annual Criccieth Festival. It was designed by Morris Roberts of Porthmadog in a fusion of the art deco and arts and crafts architectural styles and completed in 1925, the foundation stone having been laid in 1922 by David Lloyd George.

The construction of Criccieth Library on Stryd Fawr was financed by Andrew Carnegie. A plaque inside the doorway commemorates local historian Colin Gresham. Among the services provided is free broadband access.

The National Eisteddfod was held in Criccieth in 1975, and a new housing estate, Gorseddfa marks the place where the Gorsedd stones then stood.

The Brynhir Arms on Stryd Fawr dates from 1631. Originally a single storey farm building, it was extended in 1840 to serve the new turnpike road.

The Lion Hotel, an old coaching inn, was built on Y Maes in 1731. It was here that the town's councillors would retire after their meetings in Cwrt.

Several of the town's hotels, including the Marine Hotel on Min-y-Mor and the Caerwylan Hotel on Min-y-Traeth, date from the period after Porthmadog's new harbour was developed in 1811, when prosperous sea captains invested in properties where their wives could provide accommodation during the summer months.

An inn had reputedly existed on the site of the George IV Hotel in 1600, but the present building on Stryd Fawr dates from 1830, shortly after the turnpike opened. In the 1920s the hotel boasted that it generated its own electricity, and, for a fee, it offered a fire and private bath in guests' rooms. Servants could stay at reduced rates when accompanying their masters.

Clwb Cerdd Dwyfor stages performances at the Holiday Club Hall, ranging from traditional folk to opera and chamber music.

Côr Eifionydd, a mixed voice choir, was formed in 1986 to compete in the National Eisteddfod at Porthmadog the following year. Conducted by Pat Jones, originally from Newcastle Emlyn, the choir has won a number of first prizes at the National Eisteddfod. They have toured internationally and have sung in the International Choral Festival in Paris.

Actor Dyfan Dwyfor, who won the Richard Burton Award at the National Eisteddfod in 2004, is from Criccieth.

It used to be the custom, on Easter Sunday morning, for keys or pins to be thrown into Ffynnon Fair as an offering to Saint Catherine.

The town features in Welsh Incident, a humorous poem published in 1950 by Robert Graves, which tells of the mysterious creatures that supposedly, one Tuesday afternoon, "... came out / From the sea caves of Criccieth yonder." It is also the subject of Shipwrecked Mariners, a painting by English Romantic landscape painter Joseph Mallord William Turner; the painting uses his sketch of Criccieth Castle but, although the rock is depicted correctly, the building is a mirror image.