The ‘Season’
The ‘season’ at Llandrindod lasted from May to mid September. Outside the pump rooms at the Rock Park and the Pump House Hotel the visitors queued each morning to take the waters, entertained by music from the orchestras.
The amount drunk varied from two to six glasses at a time, depending on the type of ailment, and the charge at both pump rooms was 6d. per day for any amount of water. In 1909 the High Street Baths opened, offering the wide range of electrical treatments which were expected at a modern spa.
The spacious lay-out of the town meant it could cater for the growing popularity of outdoor sports. A private 9-hole golf course was opened on the common by the Pump House Hotel in 1893, possibly the first in Wales. The 18-hole course above the lake opened a club in 1906. Many of the larger hotels had tennis courts and croquet lawns on their grounds and horse races were held on the rock Ddole, a meadow near the river. In the early 1880’s Middleton Street consisted of wooden shanties and open air stalls, but it gradually replaced the High Street as the focal point of the town. The most famous shop was probably the Central Wales Emporium, opened in 1881 by William Thomas of Penybont. It sold a large variety of goods, including a range of illustrated guide books and a type of cloth named ‘Spa Flannel’. This business closed in 1927, when the spa was in decline.
“Here were accommodation for the invalid of whatever rank and distinction, field amusements for the healthy…. balls, billiards and regular assemblies varied the pastimes of the gay and the fashionable.”
The premier spa in Wales
The wells at Llandrindod had been resorted to as early 1696, when the Vaughans of Herefordshire stayed for three weeks to take the waters.
A boom town!
The Central Wales line from Knighton to Llandrindod Wells was opened in 1865 putting Llandrindod Wells in easy reach of the urban centres of the North West, the midlands and South Wales.
The ‘Season’
The ‘season’ lasted from May to mid September. Outside the pump rooms at the Rock Park and the Pump House Hotel the visitors queued each morning to take the waters, entertained by music from the orchestras.
