For the Eisteddfod

The Esteddfod festival is a celebration of Welsh Language and Culture, what better way to emulate this than through a building that celebrates the history and location of the site of the festival itself?

After visiting the site, I recorded and analysed accessibility and circulation, this led me to decide to place my building on the centre dock at the wider end. By doing this I hope to savour the pedestrianised space and enhance the social fabric of the city. Here it is also exposed to sunlight for more hours of the day, meaning the stage can be well lit. It’s seclusion on the dock elevates it and lets the building be celebrated in its isolation, drawing people towards it.

On my second visit to the site, I thought it was important to look for the smaller details that are often overlooked. The mooring rings on the ground, stood out to me, they’re clearly disused now but still important in terms of the context of the bay’s history. I took this discarded feature of the bay and used them to make my building more interactive, by creating a climbing wall out of them. It responds to the needs of the national Eisteddfod festival in that it provides a stage for performers and a seating area for the audience. The seating is a permanent concrete structure that has a sculptural element in its geometric triangular shape. The seating can also simply be used as a viewing spot to sit and enjoy the landscape of the bay or sit and eat/rest. Underneath the stairs/seating there is a toilet, storage space, space for the performers to change and get ready and finally a multifunctional space. Its large scale is to cater for some of the 150,000 visitors each year to the festival. The stage is the ephemeral element of my design, as this is the part that is only required once a year for the Music, dance, visual arts, literature, performances etc.

This is a sustainable timber structure that can be built around the stairs/seating acting as a shelter, tech space and creating a unique long and triangular stage. I chose to use this shape because it draws the visitors focus to the bay in the background, as your line of sight follows down through the shape. I also chose not to include a backdrop because by leaving the gap behind the performers we can make the most of the site and appreciate the views.