WELSH SLATE
PENRHYN QUARRY
BETHESDA
BANGOR
GWYNEDD LL57 4YG
Tel: 01248 600656
Fax: enquiries@welshslate.com
Suppliers of: Roofing slates, slate cladding, slate paving, slate floor tiles, walling, sills and copings, decorative & construction aggregates, monoliths & feature stones, fire surrounds/hearths and worktops/counters.
Welsh Slate is the world’s leading supplier of high-quality slate and supplies the UK construction market with highly durable roofing slates, facade cladding, slate paving, walling, sills, copings, decorative and construction aggregates and hard landscaping products. For internal projects, Welsh Slate manufacture and supply slate tiles for flooring, fire surrounds, bespoke kitchen worktops and counters.
Environmentally Responsible
Welsh Slate’s Penrhyn quarry has been supplying roofing slate worldwide since the 13th Century and has a long tradition of being specified by architects, and our client base also includes leading developers and interior designers. As a result of our work we are committed to conducting our business in an environmentally responsible manner by minimising the environmental impact and promoting sustainable development within its operations and services. Welsh Slate operates an Environmental Management System EMS 539237 certified to ISO 14001
CPD Seminar
This seminar is designed to help architect and specifiers to understand the manufacturing process and the potential applications of Welsh Slate as a building material. It will explain the advantages and problems with slate and clarify the difference between differnent slates from around the world. The presentation will inform delegates of the variety of applications for Welsh Slate and provide information on the standards, accreditations, classifications and fixing methods.
CPD Factory Tour
The two hour tour will demonstrate the current slate quarrying and production processes while in addition giving you some hands on experience of working with a natural product. For enquiries or to arrange a CPD please telephone our sales office on the telephone number above or alternatively click here and fill out an enquiry form.
Our wide range of products include:
Roofing Slate
Welsh slate is proven to out last any other roofing material and is guaranteed to have a productive life in excess of 100 years. Available in three colour variants and three thickness grades and can be supplied up to 1.2 meters wide.
Welsh Slate roofing is produced in accordance with BS EN 12326
Hard Landscaping
Welsh Slate can be used for a wide variety of domestic or commercial garden and landscaping applications. Welsh Slate can provide colour, texture and unique practical qualities for any hard landscaping project.
Welsh Slate is easily maintained and hard wearing, making it perfect for paths, patios, walling, coping stone, monoliths, feature stones and other hard landscaping focal points. The unique chemical qualities of Welsh Slate means it will not alter the PH values of soils and it’s safe to use with pond life. Welsh Slate’s natural durability and resistance to weather, temperature, mossing, and colour erosion make it superbly adaptable and probably the most flexible material.
Exteriors
Welsh Slate is the perfect natural exterior construction product. It’s non-porous, exceptionally uniform, inert, non-combustible and probably the most adaptable material for the widest range of exterior applications including cladding, sills and steps & thresholds. Slate is totally unreactive to both acid and alkali, this chemical stability makes it compatible with all other building materials
Available in various colours and finishes, with naturally occurring veining and textures
Interiors
Welsh Slate is practical, easily maintained, and beautiful and is used in interiors for its natural beauty, hard-wearing properties and uniqueness and can add a smooth warm to touch finish or texture to flooring, cladding and worktops. Slate flooring works well with underfloor heating.
Construction Aggregates and Minerals
Construction slate aggregate is supplied for use in precast and ready-mixed concrete, road building and civil engineering. Slate granules are used to produce bituminous roofing felts and artificial slate roofing tiles. Testing information is available on request.
Further technical information, image galleries and product specifications are available through the Welsh Slate website or via the BPi Download Library.
Welsh Slate helps with a lifeline to a historic hospital
Welsh Slate helps with a lifeline to a historic hospital
Welsh Slate donates materials to the conservation of the hospital that used to service its quarry.
Work on the conservation of a historic and ground-breaking community hospital within a World Heritage Site is due to commence this month (November), thanks in part to Welsh Slate.
Penrhyn Quarry Hospital, also known locally as Ysbyty Brynllwyd, was built in Bethesda village in the late 1840s by former quarry owner Colonel Pennant for the rapid treatment of quarrymen injured at work, as well as injured visitors to Snowdonia.
Facilities included three four-bed wards, a surgery, waiting room and nearby mortuary, as many of the quarry accidents were fatal. It was the site of the first successful operation under anaesthetic in north-west Wales - a mid-thigh amputation in 1847.
However, the much-loved hospital closed in the mid-20th Century and all that remains of the Scheduled Monument now are crumbling walls in woodland near the Lôn Las Ogwen cycle track which connects Port Penrhyn to local communities, the slate landscape and mountains beyond.
Welsh Slate, part of the Breedon Group who currently operate Penrhyn Quarry, have donated a significant number of slate products to aid the conservation work by Recclesia, a contractor experienced in historic building conservation, for Cyngor Gwynedd and Cadw, as part of the Llewyrch o'r Llechi Levelling Up scheme which is funded by the UK Government.
The project includes stabilising and consolidating the deteriorating condition of the standing walls, masonry and pointing mortar, introducing stone copings and flaunching to the wall heads to reduce water ingress, conserving the remaining architectural and historic details within, and managing vegetation growth.
The materials being donated by Welsh Slate were identified by conservation architects Donald Insall Associates during a programme of recording and emergency works involving vegetation clearance and masonry work carried out earlier this year.
The Welsh Slate products include 125m of 400mm x 750mm x 25-30mm wall copings from sharp, palfia or hard block cut to size and hand split to protect the exposed wall heads, and 50 2000mm x 200mm x 250mm lintels with natural jointing/riven faces from quarry pillars to support the openings.
Barry O'Connor, General Manager, Welsh Slate, Special Aggregates, Circular Economy, at Breedon Group, added: "We are thrilled to be part of the work to conserve Penrhyn Quarry Hospital. We understand the fondness for the site locally and as landowners want to ensure it is maintained as sensitively as possible.
"As a proud partner in the project, we are delighted that our contribution of materials towards the work will enable funding to go further towards the sensitive conservation of the structure."
The initial conservation work is expected to take around seven months, and open days will be arranged during that time to allow members of the public to see firsthand what is going on. HistoryPoints* QR codes beside the footpath enable people to read about the hospital on their smartphones.
Councillor Nia Jeffreys, Cyngor Gwynedd's Cabinet Member for Economy and Community said: "This essential work will safeguard the monument for future generations, facilitating better opportunities for access and interpretation of this much-loved site. Cyngor Gwynedd is pleased to be a partner in this project and is looking forward to working with Welsh Slate and Cadw on the scheme."
Elgan Jones of Donald Insall Associates said: "The removal of the vegetation highlighted the fragile condition of the building fabric and without this intervention would likely deteriorate at an accelerated rate, rendering the structure unsafe and eventually result in its collapse. We are thrilled to work alongside a passionate project team with a shared goal to safeguard the fabric and conserve the architectural and historical details, which tells us of its former use and role within the wider slate landscape."
Lord Dafydd Wigley, Chair of The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales World Heritage Site Partnership Board, said: "The story of health and welfare within the slate valleys is a vital and fascinating part of its history. The quarrymen were trailblazers when it came to social care, and these hospitals led the way in many of the treatments and medication we rely so heavily upon in today's health service.
"Safeguarding this structure is vital in telling the story of healthcare across the World Heritage Site, so to ensure that Penrhyn Quarry Hospital is able to relay the story of its location by securing the structure and including interpretation is a fantastic prospect."
For more information on Penrhyn quarry hospital, go to Ruins of quarry hospital, Bethesda - History Points, and for a video on the restoration work, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjRXXGjomZ4.
*HistoryPoints was established in 2012 to exploit mobile internet technology as a means of delivering historical information to the public as they visit featured locations in Wales. By 2018, it had created QR codes for display at more than 1,400 places of interest across the country.
Photo credit (left): Paul Smith
Cladding and countertops from Welsh Slate feature at London's latest luxury hotel.
Welsh Slate tops the heights, and the menu, at The Peninsula London
Cladding and countertops from Welsh Slate feature at London's latest luxury hotel.
London's latest luxury hotel, and the Hong Kong and Shanghai Hotels' first in the UK, has opened to much acclaim, and with Welsh Slate at its very heart.
With architecture conceived by Hopkins Architects to gracefully harmonise with the heritage buildings of Belgravia, The Peninsula London also embodies a sleek, spacious aesthetic that floods its exquisite Peter Marino-designed interiors with natural light.
The world-class 190-room hotel, along with 25 opulent luxury residences, centres around an expansive entrance courtyard off Grosvenor Place, landscaped in the style of a classic English garden with hand-crafted granite paving, cascading ivy, wisteria vines and two 120-year-old Japanese maple trees.
It is here that Welsh Slate's own heritage probably makes its most obvious mark, as the courtyard columns are faced with Cwt-y-Bugail cladding. This cladding also features as individual slabs measuring up to 2.2m long x 900mm high x 40mm thick on the facades of the two storeys of penthouse apartments which top the multiple storeys of Portland stone below. Welsh Slate also tops the menu in the upper-level restaurant terraces where Cwt-y-Bugail features on the waiters' stations.
Cwt-y-Bugail Honed slate is a premium Welsh slate known for its natural beauty and durability. Its rich, dark grey colour, and smooth, Honed finish complements the timeless elegance of The Peninsula London perfectly.
The 40mm thick slate used for the external cladding provides a stylish but robust and weather-resistant layer of protection, while the slate used for the internal cladding on the courtyard columns adds a touch of sophistication and refinement.
Hopkins Architects said: "Materials for this prestigious project were carefully selected, with the project team visiting quarries across the UK to select the very best. Welsh slate, used to form the piers on the top two storeys, was selected from a quarry near Anglesey, with individual slabs measuring up to 1.4m x 900mm high x 40mm thick."
The 20mm thick slate used for the waiter stations in the restaurant terraces is both durable and easy to clean, making it ideal for a high-traffic area.
Matthew Allen, production director at Tekne, who installed the waiters' stations, said: "The Welsh Slate counter tops are a quality product, were very easy to install (being laid on a bed of grout/cement), and look absolutely fabulous. Being produced from a natural, hardwearing material will make them particularly low maintenance and resilient to the London atmosphere/environment."
In addition to its aesthetic appeal, Cwt-y-Bugail Honed slate offers many practical benefits, being a low-maintenance material that is easy to clean and maintain. It is also resistant to fire, water and staining, making it ideal for use in a variety of applications.
Hopkins Architects' brief for The Peninsula London, was to create a hotel and residences of exceptional quality. Looking across three Royal Parks as well as the grounds of nearby Buckingham Palace, The Peninsula London faces Wellington Arch and surrounding public space.
The unique context and history of this site, formerly a 1960s office block, have been carefully explored and are reflected in the architectural design, detailing and a materials palette which is limited to the highest quality materials typical to the area.
The form of The Peninsula London has been inspired by the Palazzo Farnese in Rome - a ‘four square' building with streets to either side, facing onto a public space and overlooking greenery to the rear elevation. It is simply and logically organised on four wings with eight levels of accommodation arranged around the central courtyard.
At the upper levels, the building sets back to create a series of planted terraces and beautiful external spaces, and to create bar and restaurant space with leafy views over Hyde Park. A further five floors sit below ground and house a spectacular double-height ballroom, The Peninsula Spa and Wellness Centre, facilities for the Residences, as well as car parking and hotel servicing.
The scale and ambition of this building presented Hopkins with an extraordinary design challenge - to ensure the complex functional requirements and back-of-house operations can run in perfect tandem with the idea of a bespoke, hand-made building which expresses luxury at every turn and creates a welcoming and memorable experience for each and every resident or guest.
The facades of the primary storeys are composed of base bed Portland Stone, historically used on London's monuments and major civic buildings, and generously proportioned to create a sense of permanence and solidity. Throughout the building, materials have been chosen for their warmth, elegant or tactile properties.
After defining the spatial arrangement and scale of the functions, Hopkins Architects has coordinated and detailed the internal architecture to ensure that the final product is seamless and consistent in its vision of a new luxury aesthetic for London.
The design process involved extensive engagement with main contractor Sir Robert McAlpine, Historic England and Westminster City Council.
