Conwy is home to a World Heritage Site: Castles and Town Walls of King Edward in Gwynedd

Tubular Railway BridgeGrade I listedPlas MawrGrade I listedThe Old Toll HouseGrade II listedThe GuildhallGrade II listedGeorge and Dragon InnGrade II listed+17See all photos

Photos from Wikimedia Commons and Geograph, copied to our own server, each credited to its photographer with its licence; names open the building’s page or its official list entry.

1770s

1790s

c. 1795

c. 1828

1890

1890

c. 1890

1903

Public domain, from Wikimedia Commons, copied to our own server. Each credit opens the image’s page with its full description and history.

Cadw lists buildings of special architectural or historic interest in three grades: Grade I for buildings of exceptional interest, Grade II* for particularly important buildings of more than special interest, and Grade II for buildings of special interest. Listing protects the whole building, inside and out.

Every entry on Cadw’s register of listed buildings whose point lies inside the ONS 2022 built-up-area boundary. One list entry can cover a terrace or a group of buildings. Neighbourhood dots: the population-weighted centre of each Census 2021 output area, coloured by its neighbourhood’s (LSOA’s) share of homes built before 1919 (Valuation Office Agency, March 2025).

Of the 220 entries, 55 are named by a street address; the rest are named buildings such as churches, halls and bridges.

Search the rest on Cadw’s records →

Cadw’s conservation areas via DataMapWales. Hectares are the part of each area inside the built-up area.

The first 16 entries were listed in 1950, 6 of the 7 Grade I buildings among them. 100 came in 1981. Only 0 have been added in the last 15 years.

World Heritage

4 scheduled monuments

Nationally important archaeological sites and monuments, protected by law; work on them needs consent from the Welsh Government (Cadw).

Castell ConwyMedieval; Castle

Conwy Town WallsMedieval; Town Wall

Plas MawrPost Medieval/Modern; House (domestic)

MedievalSite of Medieval King's Hall and Wardrobe, Rosehill StreetMedieval; Building (Unclassified)

Two measures, each ranked against every UK town of 1,000 or more, with protected heritage counting twice as much as the age of homes. Protected heritage counts each listed building by its grade (Grade I three points, II* two, II one), each scheduled monument and battlefield two, and each registered park or garden by its grade; it is ranked both per 10,000 residents and as a total, so a village with one fine church doesn’t outrank a historic city. The second measure is the share of homes built before 1919, from the Valuation Office Agency’s council tax records. History is a character grade: it describes the town and isn’t part of the overall grade.

John Williams

Rhys Cadwaladr

John Gibson

Fanny Parkes

Helena Jones

Harold Lowe

Rosa Lee

155016001650170017501800185019001950

Harold Lowe1882–1944 · British sailor (1882-1944)

John Gibson1790–1866 · Welsh sculptor (1790-1866)

FP

Fanny Parkes1794–1875 · British travel writer on India (1794-1875)

John Williams1582–1650 · Welsh clergyman and political advisor to King James I

HJ

Helena Jones1870–1946 · British suffragette (1870–1946)

RC

Rhys Cadwaladr1666–1690 · Welsh poet and academic

Rosa Lee1884–1976 · Statistician

Everyone born in Conwy → Birthplaces from Wikidata; portraits from Wikimedia Commons.

Part of Castles and Town Walls of King Edward in Gwynedd, a World Heritage Site, lies in Conwy. All told, the list holds 220 listed buildings, 7 of them Grade I. For its size, it has more listed heritage than 88% of UK towns. Its Grade I buildings cluster together: 6 of them stand within 400 m of Conwy Castle.

Only 13 of the 524 towns nearest its size have more Grade I buildings. Berry Street alone has 8 listed buildings. A conservation area has protected part of it since 1975. The rest is about typical: it also has 4 scheduled monuments; and 17% of its homes were built before 1919, close to the 15% in the typical UK town.