St Fagans National Museum of History

St Fagans opened in 1948 in the grounds of an Elizabethan manor and has been moving Welsh buildings here ever since, brick by numbered brick. There are now more than forty: farmhouses, a tannery, a chapel, a village school, the Oakdale Workmen's Institute, and a row of workers' cottages from Rhyd-y-car near Merthyr Tydfil furnished house by house from 1800 to 1985, so you walk forward through time down one terrace. The medieval church of St Teilo has been repainted inside in the colours it carried before the Reformation, which is startling if you only know English parish churches as bare stone. Craftsmen work on site, and entry costs nothing.

The main sights

• Rhyd-y-car cottages - one terrace furnished house by house from 1800 to 1985.
• St Teilo's Church - a medieval church repainted in its pre-Reformation colours.
• The Oakdale Institute - a miners' welfare hall rebuilt from the valleys.
• The working trades - smiths, potters and a miller producing on site.

When to go

April to October, when all the buildings are staffed and open and the parkland is worth the walking. Weekdays in term time are quiet; weekends and Welsh school holidays fill with families. Some houses close in winter and the site is exposed. Allow a full day, because half is not enough for forty buildings.

Practical notes

It spreads over a hundred acres with hills, and the amount of walking surprises people. Not every building is open every day, with no reliable way to know in advance. Free entry plus charged parking irritates some visitors. The indoor galleries can feel thin next to the outdoor collection, and the cafe struggles at peak times.

Nearby

St Fagans Castle and its terraced gardens on the same site; Cardiff is fifteen minutes east.

Key facts