The hidden history of Cardiff that you pass by every day without realising

Cardiff is full of history and some of it is well known. But if you know where to look, you can find some hidden gems and discover hidden history right in the heart of the capital.

To help you out, we’ve put together a 20-minute walk that will take you past some of these hidden gems. It’s a short and accessible route, with plenty to see along the way.

Starting Point: Park Place

We start at Park Place, close to Cardiff’s civic centre. Here you’ll see the Grade I listed Park House. Designed by legendary architect William Burges, who also designed Castell Coch and part of Cardiff Castle, it was seen as “revolutionary in Cardiff domestic architecture” when it was built and Cadw considers the building “perhaps the most important 19th-century house in Wales”.

However, the interesting thing to note about this building – although you can’t fully appreciate it from the outside – is that it contains one of the few mistakes Burges made during his career. He made a major mistake in the interior design because as soon as you walk through the entrance, you’re faced with the bottom of a colossal staircase.

Towards Queen Street

Take a walk south to the famous main street, Queen Street. Heading towards Poundland, you will see an ornate letter M on either side of the building.

This means Marments, which was a popular department store that previously called the building home. In March 1986, the South Wales Echo revealed that Cardiff’s oldest department store had been sold and would close in September. Then chairman and managing director Arthur Marment told the Echo: “I feel very bad about it, but I know it was the only right thing to do. It would be sheer madness to carry on.”

Leaving Poundland behind, head towards the castle end of Queen Street. There you’ll see one of the city’s many Starbucks branches. Ignore the sign and look up. The building is made of Portland stone and features an art deco elephant head that was seen across the UK on branches of Montague Burton in the 1930s.

In front of the castle

When you get to the end of Queen Street, turn right at Pizza Hut. You’ll come to HopBunker, formerly the legendary Barfly club, and you’ll see a really innocuous-looking street on the right. Walk down it and you’ll see a random patch of old-looking brick wall with the outline of a stone slab on it. It might look like nothing now, but it’s actually pretty cool.

Cardiff’s city walls once surrounded much of the city centre. They were over 2km long and in some places were 3m high. Unfortunately, little remains of them today. The wall you can see in front of you is the largest remaining part of that wall.

Once you’ve soaked up the wall for a bit, head back outside and indulge in Burger King on the corner where Castle Street and Queen Street meet. What you probably won’t know is that if you head upstairs, through a few doors and into an area marked ‘No Trespassing’, you’ll find a room that’s a far cry from the fast food décor below. Known as the Mahogany Room, it features deep mahogany panelling, intricate mosaics and stained glass windows, and explains why it’s a Grade II listed building.

The Mahogany Bar, as the premises were formerly called, was first established in 1905 by wine importers Fulton Dunlop Company Limited, but it is believed that a public house or inn existed on the site from at least 1720. When the bar first opened its doors in 1905, beer cost just a penny a pint and a half pint of whisky could be purchased for 1s 3d. Drinkers at the Green Dragon, and later the Mahogany Room, included shipowners, stockbrokers and members of Cardiff Borough Council.

Before we move on, we suggest you take a second to look at the statue of Aneurin Bevan at the end of Queen Street, near the castle. What people don’t know is that in the 18th century this area was the city’s bullring. In 1773, a spectator was gored to death in this area while watching the bulls fight.

Descending towards The Hayes

As you head south from Burger King towards The Hayes, there’s the building that used to house the much-loved Howells department store. Until recently, it was the House of Fraser, but it’s now closed and is being redeveloped. When it reopens, there are some great pieces of history to see here.

The first is the large plaque on the wall dedicated to Rawlins White. Rawlins was a Protestant preacher in the 1500s who was burned at the stake in the Welsh capital.

The memorial says:

Near this stained one suffered for the truth

March 30, 1555.

Rawlins White. A fisherman from this town.

Who was the fisherman Rawlins White? The simple answer to that is he was an absolute rebel. If you want to read his story, you can click the link here. It’s worth five minutes of your time.

The interior of the building itself is quite special. Where it is, a large chapel once stood on the site. As the town began to grow and expand, Bethany Private Baptist Chapel was eventually swallowed up by the department store, but you can still see a bit of the original building inside. You can read the full story of the chapel here.

Back at The Hayes, you’ll see the Old Library. Stand with your back to the new library and look at the front of the building (you may have to maneuver a bit because of the trees in the way). Above it is a bust of a woman wearing a helmet. Local rumor has it that this head is Boudicca, but that’s not true. The bust is of the Greek goddess of wisdom, Athena (because it was a library—get it?).

Continue south down The Hayes and you’ll notice some metal posts with small viewing holes. If you look inside, you can see artwork by artist Jane Edden and students from the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, called Post Secrets.

St Mary Street, Womanby Street and Westgate Street

After finishing with The Hayes, your journey now takes you to the Central Station end of St Mary Street. There you will see the Prince of Wales Wetherspoon pub. There was once a church named St Mary on the street, but it was washed away in the Great Flood of 1607, which killed 2,000 people along the coasts of South Wales, Devon, Somerset and Gloucester.

Although this tragedy is not widely known, the pub that now stands on the street bears a tribute to it. There is an outline of St Mary’s on the side of the pub to show where it once stood.

After this, you can head up St Mary Street towards the castle. While you’re at it, keep an eye out for the big cats. There’s a huge stone lion on top of the Sandringham Hotel. Built in the 1880s, the Sandringham Hotel was once known as The Black Lion and was a popular spot for farmers from Glamorgan and Monmouth, especially on market days.

Once you reach Church Street, turn left and you’ll find your way to Womanby Street. In the 19th century, migrant workers coming to Cardiff lived in the slums of Jones Court, just off Womanby Street. The houses had just two rooms, no water supply or drainage, and were poorly ventilated. You can still see the old-fashioned-looking buildings within the block, now in stark contrast to the modern capital around them.

You can end your journey by leaving Womanby Street the way you came in and heading down Westgate Street. If you turn right, you’ll come to the familiar sight of Cardiff Arms Park. You might, however, miss the plaque on the gates. They’re named after Welsh rugby player Gwyn Nicholls, who captained Cardiff in the early 1900s.

Gwyn won 24 caps for Wales, including 10 as captain, and was the only Welshman on the British Isles team’s tour of Australia in 1899. His story ends sadly. In 1923 he went on holiday to Weston-super-Mare. While there he jumped into the sea fully clothed to rescue two young girls who had been swept overboard. The girls survived, but sadly Gwyn never fully recovered from the ordeal. On Boxing Day 1949 the gates were officially opened at Cardiff Arms Park by his team-mate Rhys Gabe.