Information about Craig-y-mor
Craig-y-mor is in an elevated position on a rocky promontory, set back from the South West side of Lon Isallt and on the coastline overlooking Porth yr Afon, West of Trearddur Bay.
It is a large austere house in neo-Georgian style. The roof has grey slates with hipped gable dormers and tall rectangular chimneys. Made from stone quarried a few miles away, the house appears to be part of the headland. Designed by F G Hicks, architect of Dublin. Construction of the house began 1911, work ceased during the First World War and recommenced shortly afterwards, finally completed in 1919. Built for William Smellie, an Englishman and one of a number who built holiday homes around Porth Diana. The house continues to be owned by members of the Jones family.
On the ground floor, the house has a large dining room, large lounge, reading room, WC, entrance hall, drinks cellar, kitchen dining room, kitchen, pantry & scullery. On the 1st floor are 8 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms and a large hallway provides independent access to each room. On the 2nd floor there are 3 large bedrooms and a games room.
Attached to the main house is a servant’s lodge that comprises of 2 bedrooms, kitchen, living room and bathroom.
There are numerous outbuildings comprising of a large boat store, engine room, workshop and coal store. There is also a larger shed set near the private beach.
The house is set on a large plot that encompasses its own private road, large driveway/parking area, private beach, large field with derelict walled garden and 2nd headland.
Craig-y-mor is in an elevated position on a rocky promontory, set back from the South West side of Lon Isallt and on the coastline overlooking Porth yr Afon, West of Trearddur Bay.
It is a large austere house in neo-Georgian style. The roof has grey slates with hipped gable dormers and tall rectangular chimneys. Made from stone quarried a few miles away, the house appears to be part of the headland. Designed by F G Hicks, architect of Dublin. Construction of the house began 1911, work ceased during the First World War and recommenced shortly afterwards, finally completed in 1919. Built for William Smellie, an Englishman and one of a number who built holiday homes around Porth Diana. The house continues to be owned by members of the Jones family.
On the ground floor, the house has a large dining room, large lounge, reading room, WC, entrance hall, drinks cellar, kitchen dining room, kitchen, pantry & scullery. On the 1st floor are 8 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms and a large hallway provides independent access to each room. On the 2nd floor there are 3 large bedrooms and a games room.
Attached to the main house is a servant’s lodge that comprises of 2 bedrooms, kitchen, living room and bathroom.
There are numerous outbuildings comprising of a large boat store, engine room, workshop and coal store. There is also a larger shed set near the private beach.
The house is set on a large plot that encompasses its own private road, large driveway/parking area, private beach, large field with derelict walled garden and 2nd headland.
A SHORT HISTORY OF CRAIG-Y-MOR,TREARDDUR BAY
The building of Craig-y-mor was completed in about 1919. The project was conceived by William Smellie. He was born in Glasgow in the 1870's. As a young man he moved to work in Liverpool as a clerk in Meade King Robinson, a firm which then produced whale oil which was sold to companies such as Lever Bros. , later Unilever, for the production of soap. The firm still exists but now manufactures tallow and wax for candles. William Smellie succeeded in this business becoming managing director and chairman. He lived in Wallasey with his wife and five children, two sons, the eldest born in 1900, and three daughters. His wife was Ethel Graham, whose family came from Huddersfield, and whose brother became Sir Crosland Graham of Clwyd Hall.
At the beginning of the 20th century a small number of successful Liverpool businessmen would bring their families to Trearddur Bay for their holidays. The Smellie family took over a farmhouse called Issalt Bach, owned by the Griffith family, very close to where the house now stands. In common with a few other well off visitors or holidaymakers, he decided to build a holiday home. He chose as his architect a man called Hicks from Dublin. There is one other house in Trearddur designed by Hicks. That is Marysland on the old Trearddur Road on the shore of the Inland Sea. It was owned by a family called Good who had Dublin connections. Whether that is how William Smellie met and chose Hicks or whether he introduced him to the Goods is not known.
Mr Smellie's first choice of site was on the headland to the northeast of Porth Diana where Highground now stands. In those days a small coal boat used to dock against the rocks below the proposed site. One can still see the sheer rock face which clearly was used as a jetty. Mr Smellie offered to buy out the small coal business but the proprietor refused to sell. As a result the site was transferred to the present position.
Building started before the start of the First World War but was stopped during hostilities. All the facing stone was cut out of the cliffs to the west and north of Porth Daffarch. The artificial cuts in the cliff can still be seen. The rock was then transported to the site by sea. The present road up to the house and around the beach head was the main road to Porth-y-Post and beyond. Mr Smellie agreed with the local authority that in return for his acquiring that road he would build what is now the existing road between the Cliff Hotel and the Craig-y-Mor field.
The house as it stands now is almost exactly the same as it was when built. Originally there were just two rooms above the garage. The idea was that they would be accommodation for a chauffeur or staff. As such they were never used but they did house soldiers during the Second World War who were stationed at the Cliff Hotel.
Electricity for the house was provided by a generator housed in the room at the bottom of the outside staircase leading down from the back yard. The electricity was stored in glass batteries filled with distilled water which were kept in a shed next to the garage where the existing flat kitchen is. In the 1950's the two rooms and the battery house were converted into the existing flat. This was done to house the family of the then housekeeper, Megan Lloyd. She had started in service in 1942 at the age of 17. She lived in what were known as the staff quarters in the corridor off the first landing. In the 1950's she married Gomer Thomas who worked on the railways. To ensure that he retained Meagan's service, Mr Smellie converted these rooms into an apartment of kitchen, living room and two bedrooms. The Thomas family lived there until the 1970's since when it has been occupied by various caretakers.
The original house plans not only catered for a fresh water system but also there were designs for a system to provide salt water baths... This was never completed but the pipe system can still be seen in places.
Originally all cooking was done on a solid fuel Esse in what is now the downstairs dining/breakfast room, then the kitchen, which also heated the water. What is now the kitchen was then the scullery. Later the Esse was removed and a solid fuel Agamatic was installed in the present kitchen to heat the water. That was subsequently removed when an oil-fired system was installed with the boiler in the old engine room/coal cellar area. Central heating radiators are fitted into the downstairs rooms. Mr Smellie would not countenance heating in the bedrooms save for coal fires.
In many ways the house and its fittings are unique. Quite apart from the outside stone, all the internal fittings were custom made. The pipes for water and the limited heating system were laid in concrete under the floors which causes problems if leaks occur. The roof is a masterpiece, only having lost a handful of slates since it was built.
Outside, the garage was designed to hold a number of cars with sliding doors at each end so that cars could be moved out the far end to be washed. There was a large kitchen and flower garden inside the wall across the approach road, the remains of the walls of which can still be seen. At the front seaward side there is a cave in front of which there is a natural bathing place at high tide. In the summer wooden steps were set up and there steps down cut into the rock. Mr Smellie built a jetty along the side of the main rock on the beach. There were moorings for family boats in the Lagoon with running moorings for dinghies. At one point all the boats moored in the Lagoon belonged to the house. For one boat, Fan Tan, rail lines were laid to launch her down the beach with a winch to haul her up at the end of the season.
The Smellies used the house as a summer house until the late 1920's when William Smellie was very ill. He and his wife moved permanently to the house. He was always keen on the sea and sailing and in 1919 he was the inspiration behind the founding of the Trearddur Bay Sailing Club. One of the original sailing boats from the start of the club, Ant, still remains at the house together with Tern, mentioned below and the original dinghies, Punch and Elvira. All his family were equally keen. His eldest son, Jim, was a foundation member of the Royal Ocean Racing Club, becoming its First Rear Commodore. His second son, Donald, was drowned in 1927, aged about 25, when sailing the family's Seabird Association Halfrater from Trearddur to the Menai Straits and was lost on the Caernarvon Bar just off Llandwyn Island. Tern remains in family ownership at Craig-mor. During the Second World War Jim Smellie served in Minesweepers and retired as a Lieutenant Commander RNVR. The three daughters all served in the WRNS. The second one, Margaret, was commissioned. In 1941 she married Edward Warburton Jones, a Northern Ireland barrister then serving in the Royal Irish Fusiliers, a battalion of which were stationed in the Cliff Hotel. Margaret and their eldest son spent the rest of the war with Mr and Mrs Smellie at Craig-y-Mor. Margaret died at the house in January 1953 and Edward Jones married the third daughter in September 1953. William Smellie died in 1955 and his wife died in 1961. The house then passed to the third daughter Ruth and in 1978 she and Edward Jones passed the house into the joint names of the four Jones sons. The house is still owned by the Jones family today.
Mr. and Mrs. William Smellie, two of their daughters Margaret and Ruth, their son Donald and son-in-law Edward Jones are all buried across the bay at Rhoscolyn where there is also a memorial plaque to their grandson, Peter.
The building of Craig-y-mor was completed in about 1919. The project was conceived by William Smellie. He was born in Glasgow in the 1870's. As a young man he moved to work in Liverpool as a clerk in Meade King Robinson, a firm which then produced whale oil which was sold to companies such as Lever Bros. , later Unilever, for the production of soap. The firm still exists but now manufactures tallow and wax for candles. William Smellie succeeded in this business becoming managing director and chairman. He lived in Wallasey with his wife and five children, two sons, the eldest born in 1900, and three daughters. His wife was Ethel Graham, whose family came from Huddersfield, and whose brother became Sir Crosland Graham of Clwyd Hall.
At the beginning of the 20th century a small number of successful Liverpool businessmen would bring their families to Trearddur Bay for their holidays. The Smellie family took over a farmhouse called Issalt Bach, owned by the Griffith family, very close to where the house now stands. In common with a few other well off visitors or holidaymakers, he decided to build a holiday home. He chose as his architect a man called Hicks from Dublin. There is one other house in Trearddur designed by Hicks. That is Marysland on the old Trearddur Road on the shore of the Inland Sea. It was owned by a family called Good who had Dublin connections. Whether that is how William Smellie met and chose Hicks or whether he introduced him to the Goods is not known.
Mr Smellie's first choice of site was on the headland to the northeast of Porth Diana where Highground now stands. In those days a small coal boat used to dock against the rocks below the proposed site. One can still see the sheer rock face which clearly was used as a jetty. Mr Smellie offered to buy out the small coal business but the proprietor refused to sell. As a result the site was transferred to the present position.
Building started before the start of the First World War but was stopped during hostilities. All the facing stone was cut out of the cliffs to the west and north of Porth Daffarch. The artificial cuts in the cliff can still be seen. The rock was then transported to the site by sea. The present road up to the house and around the beach head was the main road to Porth-y-Post and beyond. Mr Smellie agreed with the local authority that in return for his acquiring that road he would build what is now the existing road between the Cliff Hotel and the Craig-y-Mor field.
The house as it stands now is almost exactly the same as it was when built. Originally there were just two rooms above the garage. The idea was that they would be accommodation for a chauffeur or staff. As such they were never used but they did house soldiers during the Second World War who were stationed at the Cliff Hotel.
Electricity for the house was provided by a generator housed in the room at the bottom of the outside staircase leading down from the back yard. The electricity was stored in glass batteries filled with distilled water which were kept in a shed next to the garage where the existing flat kitchen is. In the 1950's the two rooms and the battery house were converted into the existing flat. This was done to house the family of the then housekeeper, Megan Lloyd. She had started in service in 1942 at the age of 17. She lived in what were known as the staff quarters in the corridor off the first landing. In the 1950's she married Gomer Thomas who worked on the railways. To ensure that he retained Meagan's service, Mr Smellie converted these rooms into an apartment of kitchen, living room and two bedrooms. The Thomas family lived there until the 1970's since when it has been occupied by various caretakers.
The original house plans not only catered for a fresh water system but also there were designs for a system to provide salt water baths... This was never completed but the pipe system can still be seen in places.
Originally all cooking was done on a solid fuel Esse in what is now the downstairs dining/breakfast room, then the kitchen, which also heated the water. What is now the kitchen was then the scullery. Later the Esse was removed and a solid fuel Agamatic was installed in the present kitchen to heat the water. That was subsequently removed when an oil-fired system was installed with the boiler in the old engine room/coal cellar area. Central heating radiators are fitted into the downstairs rooms. Mr Smellie would not countenance heating in the bedrooms save for coal fires.
In many ways the house and its fittings are unique. Quite apart from the outside stone, all the internal fittings were custom made. The pipes for water and the limited heating system were laid in concrete under the floors which causes problems if leaks occur. The roof is a masterpiece, only having lost a handful of slates since it was built.
Outside, the garage was designed to hold a number of cars with sliding doors at each end so that cars could be moved out the far end to be washed. There was a large kitchen and flower garden inside the wall across the approach road, the remains of the walls of which can still be seen. At the front seaward side there is a cave in front of which there is a natural bathing place at high tide. In the summer wooden steps were set up and there steps down cut into the rock. Mr Smellie built a jetty along the side of the main rock on the beach. There were moorings for family boats in the Lagoon with running moorings for dinghies. At one point all the boats moored in the Lagoon belonged to the house. For one boat, Fan Tan, rail lines were laid to launch her down the beach with a winch to haul her up at the end of the season.
The Smellies used the house as a summer house until the late 1920's when William Smellie was very ill. He and his wife moved permanently to the house. He was always keen on the sea and sailing and in 1919 he was the inspiration behind the founding of the Trearddur Bay Sailing Club. One of the original sailing boats from the start of the club, Ant, still remains at the house together with Tern, mentioned below and the original dinghies, Punch and Elvira. All his family were equally keen. His eldest son, Jim, was a foundation member of the Royal Ocean Racing Club, becoming its First Rear Commodore. His second son, Donald, was drowned in 1927, aged about 25, when sailing the family's Seabird Association Halfrater from Trearddur to the Menai Straits and was lost on the Caernarvon Bar just off Llandwyn Island. Tern remains in family ownership at Craig-mor. During the Second World War Jim Smellie served in Minesweepers and retired as a Lieutenant Commander RNVR. The three daughters all served in the WRNS. The second one, Margaret, was commissioned. In 1941 she married Edward Warburton Jones, a Northern Ireland barrister then serving in the Royal Irish Fusiliers, a battalion of which were stationed in the Cliff Hotel. Margaret and their eldest son spent the rest of the war with Mr and Mrs Smellie at Craig-y-Mor. Margaret died at the house in January 1953 and Edward Jones married the third daughter in September 1953. William Smellie died in 1955 and his wife died in 1961. The house then passed to the third daughter Ruth and in 1978 she and Edward Jones passed the house into the joint names of the four Jones sons. The house is still owned by the Jones family today.
Mr. and Mrs. William Smellie, two of their daughters Margaret and Ruth, their son Donald and son-in-law Edward Jones are all buried across the bay at Rhoscolyn where there is also a memorial plaque to their grandson, Peter.