The Hafod-Morfa site is a locally cherished place with universal and global significance and it has the potential to be as important to the city’s future as it was to the past. The task now underway is to unlock the potential of the site and design an inspirational future for the site that is shaped by its past and designed in the present.  This future will be imagined, created, and nurtured by its local community.  It will meet many needs, transform lives in many ways, and reward all who visit.

Ten years from now, Hafod-Morfa will be a landmark site for heritage, learning, innovation, and community engagement; renowned internationally, visited by people from all over the world, and home to activities and initiatives that bring life, energy, and creativity to it every day.

The site will become a vibrant, busy, and sustainable place, defined by its copper heritage, history, landscape, and architecture.

It will celebrate and honour the people of the Lower Swansea Valley’s unique contribution to the transformation of Wales, Britain, and the international economy.

It will create wealth, both material and cultural, for the people of Swansea, through a combination of educational, commercial, and community-led initiatives, which are united by local and global connections.

It will be a centre for learning and training embedded at the heart of the community, extending a long and rich tradition of innovation, enterprise, and entrepreneurialism.

The site’s functions

The Hafod-Morfa site will be a means of:

• Attracting tourists and visitors to the area
• Providing a range of new and inspiring facilities for local people
• Connecting with other developments within the area
• Creating global linkages through historic ties
• Generating wealth and offering employment opportunities within Swansea
• Ensuring that all local groupings benefit from increased energy and activity
• Sharing skills, knowledge, and expertise between groups and individuals of all ages
• Creating opportunities for those at risk of social or economic exclusion
• Enabling the co-development of multi-disciplinary research projects
• Widening Participation in learning – at all levels, for all ages, and in the worlds of science, arts and humanities, business, and social science

The Living History Laboratory

To help us fulfil these ambitions, we will create a ‘Living History Laboratory’. This will serve as a research and learning facility, and provide an environment in which spin-off companies and SMEs can be incubated and developed.

This will be an unrivalled facility embedded at the very heart of a regenerating heritage landscape of world significance

• A shared space for collaboration and community and business engagement.
• A platform for the delivery of new research, teaching and learning programmes
• A unique space for celebrating and understanding Welsh innovation, past, present, and future
• State-of-the art digital resources for use by the community, schools, colleges, and universities

Masterplan

A new vision document for the future development of the Hafod-Morfa Copperworks is now available here. The vision document, complete with maps and illustrations, shows how this site which once employed hundreds of local people will once again be a catalyst for regeneration within the Swansea Valley. It describes a combination of creative workshops, inspiring workspace, educational facilities, housing, community facilities and a living history laboratory to the site developed in sympathy with the historical character of the site.

View Document »

Plans for the next year

In 2015, we hope to apply for funding to

• Engage more people in community history, arts and creative activity on the site
• Support the friends group in practical work on the site
• Organise a community research event in the Summer
• Work on Vivian Chimney, Lime Kiln and Musgrave Engine House
• Offer more opportunities for schools and public to engage with the site
• Create a business plan for the Living History Laboratory in the Powerhouse and Laboratory Buildings.