Poet's restored birthplace opens

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Geoff and Anne Hayden have been restoring Dylan Thomas' birthplace for three years.

The restoration of Dylan Thomas's birthplace has been completed on what would have been the poet's 94th birthday.

Thomas was born at Number 5 Cwmdonkin Drive, Swansea, an Edwardian terraced-house overlooking the sea.

A city businessman and his wife have spent three years restoring the former student bedsits to how the house would have looked when Thomas lived there.

They plan to host literary events and rent the house to holidaymakers.

Many people think of the picturesque Boat House at Laugharne in Carmarthenshire as the place which inspired Thomas until his early death, at the age of 39, on a speaking tour in the US.

But Geoff Haden, the man behind the refurbishment of the house at Cwmdonkin Drive, said much of Thomas' writing was in fact nurtured there.

From the front the house looks much the same

"It's the place where the finest poet of the 20th Century lived for 20 odd years of his very short life and wrote two thirds of his output," he said.

Thomas was born in October 1914 just a few months after his parents David and Florence Thomas, and his elder sister Nancy, moved in to Cwmdonkin Drive.

As a boy, Thomas would look out of his bedroom window at the sweep of Swansea Bay and play in the nearby Cwmdonkin Park.

"It was in his formative years that he wrote everything that was eventually published because he regurgitated in later life, so this is where it all started," said Mr Haden.

He and his wife Anne have spent a labour of love restoring the house which had been used as bedsit accommodation.

Phonogram

"I think I saw the house first in 2003," said Mr Haden.

"It was like a very sad student bedsit and I thought is this how we should be treating the most famous son of Swansea?

"A year or so later the opportunity to acquire the lease of the property came up."

The couple have faithfully had restored the Edwardian décor and furniture, the phonogram in the front room, even the cast iron toilet upstairs.

Anne Haden explained they have even banned modern screws which would not have been around at the time Thomas was growing up in the house.

The house has been given complete 1914 decor

The house will now be available as self catering accommodation. Guests will even receive a 1914 newspaper.

"When we let it we will be letting it as a 1914 house.so that when you come in here on 3 December 2008, it will be the 3 December 1914.

"There'll be no television, no radio, no phones."

Thomas's daughter Aeronwy will be at the house to mark the official restoration but some people have already had a preview.

Incredibly significant

Jo Furber from the Dylan Thomas Centre, who lived in this house herself for three years, said:

"Thousands and thousands come to Swansea because they love Dylan Thomas' work and they want to know where he came from, what formed him as a write.

"After he left he was still writing about Swansea, still looking back to childhood so it's incredibly significant."

Actor Peter Read was among those who used to hold writing classes and reading groups there.

"It's a very strange experience to be in the place where he lived and has breakfast and shaved and bathed and so on," he said.

"It's a very powerful feeling that his spirit is there."

Dylan Thomas' house has a superb view of Swansea Bay