Capel Seion

Capel Seion

A chapel of restrained design, with neatly detailed front displaying a slight Classical influence but otherwise typical of late 19th-century village chapels in the district. The detailing is reminiscent of the neighbouring Capel Tabernacl, Cefneithin (1870).

The front is constructed in randomly-coursed rock-faced local sandstone with chiselled arisses at the quoins. The dressings are in render or limestone, emphasised in white paint. The chapel sides and rear are rendered apart from the exposed quoins. The roof is slate with a tile ridge and cast iron rainwater goods. A stump of a front finial survives.

The front design suggests a pediment, with a thin double-corbelled cornice. The central features of the elevation are framed in a slightly recessed arch-headed giant panel that breaks the cornice. This panel is thinly outlined with a painted stone reveal. Within it sit twin doors, an inscription stone recording the dates of the earlier chapel, a decorative tripartite upper window emphasised in a limestone frame standing on an extended sill, and at the top a decorative louvre-ventilator in a limestone frame displaying the words "Capel Seion Built 1878" in a quatrefoil frame. Tall flanking windows flank the central features. A strongly marked plinth offset course runs at the foot.

All windows have stone sills and simple round-headed tracery of three lights with decorative coloured leaded glass. The doors and flanking windows have thin rendered reveals. The double two-panel pine doors feature strong mouldings and segmental top rails with fanlights above, each incorporating a circular insert feature. The windows of the side elevations are timber, full height, with plain mullions and transoms and plain obscured glass.

An anteroom with terrazzo floor provides access to the chapel through semi-glazed doors with three lower panels. Twin stairs to the gallery have plain handrails and top doors of four panels. The window overlooking the interior and the upper panels of the doors are decoratively glazed as part of a reglazing scheme of 1953, which also included the tall flanking windows of the front elevation (lighting both anteroom and gallery) and the tripartite window lighting the gallery.

The interior of the chapel features a fine gallery supported on seven cast-iron columns with floral caps, their shafts painted to resemble marble. The gallery front is slightly cantilevered out over the support beam. Broad panels beneath a cast-iron grille with trefoil perforations and moulded top rail run along the gallery front, which is slightly curved at the corners. A central clock is positioned above. Three rows of curved seating sit at the gallery sides, five at the rear, all curved at the corners. The organ pipes are divided between two cases of modern design erected at the gallery extremities.

Downstairs, four ranges of plain pine pews with a staggered centre division and two passages run the length of the chapel. The pew ends are carved. Side pews are angled or turned inwards to face the pulpit. A low boarded dado runs along the walls. The sedd fawr (main seat) is raised 75mm and has a framed and boarded back with curved corners.

The pulpit has a panelled front with angled sides containing fretwork inserts and a heavily moulded top rail. The plinth panels are plain, topped by a chain decoration. Twin winding stairs with square newels and turned balusters ascend from it. The newels have sunk faces and dark-stained top-knobs with swept handrails. A striking large architectural back-frame to the preacher's position in Regency style consists of plasterwork: two large and two small fluted pilasters, the latter carrying a reeded architrave; a semi-elliptical fan under a framed, enriched and keyed arch springs from the larger outer pilasters, all in low relief without a central recess.

The flat ceiling is divided by main ribs into lozenges with a large circular central feature. Boarded margins run around the edges with fretwork-covered grilles at the corners.