A trip to Aberystwyth for Telegraph Travel as part of their summer seaside series.

I spent a couple of days in the Mid Wales resort to find out more about regeneration and the uniquely quirky charm of Aber.

Here’s a sample from the feature:

It was a hub of lead-mining and shipbuilding. The town boomed with genteel Victorians, taking the seaside air, turning it into the Biarritz of Wales. And, more recently, it provided the backdrop to a genre-defying Welsh noir.

The idiosyncratic seaside resort of Aberystwyth, Aber to the locals, pivots around its Norman castle with twin beaches — yet maintains an isolated air given its westerly position on Cardigan Bay.

Proudly Welsh speaking, it’s now home to the National Library of Wales, the nation’s largest Arts Centre and bolstered by a lively student population during university term times.

But there’s also an air of faded grandeur with some of the pastel-coloured Victorian and Edwardian resort hotels in desperate need of some love.

The arrival of the railway in the 1860s transformed the town’s fortunes, establishing a thriving coastal resort, the opening of the Royal Pier, the first in Wales, soon following.

There are green shoots of regeneration, too. The first phase of the wave-crashed promenade’s £10.8m facelift is almost complete.

The renaissance of the Old College, the grand old Victorian building that served first as the first home of the University of Wales, aims for 2027 completion with a new cultural centre and four-star hotel.

Read the full feature via Telegraph Travel, How Aberystwyth plans to revive the glory days of the British seaside.

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