Uplands ( cy, Pantygwydr) is a suburb and

community A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place, norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, ...

of Swansea,

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the Bristol Channel to the south. It had a population in ...

. It lies about a mile (2 km) to the west of

Swansea city centre Swansea city centre in Swansea, Wales, contains the main shopping, leisure and nightlife district in Swansea. The city centre covers much of the Castle ward including the area around Oxford Street, Castle Square, and the Quadrant Shopping Centr ...

, and falls within the Uplands electoral ward. It is centred on the A4118 road, which links Swansea city centre and

Sketty The suburban district of Sketty ( cy, Sgeti) is about 2 miles (3.2 km) west of the Swansea city centre on Gower Road. It falls within the Sketty council ward of Swansea. It is also a community. Description The area approximates to the Vivi ...

. The main road begins as Walter Road from the east, and becomes Sketty Road towards the west. Much of the area is hilly. The population of the community and ward in 2011 was 15,665 and in terms of Welsh identity had the lowest percentage in the county.

The area

Uplands' main shopping area is located on and around Uplands Crescent, where small businesses mix with fast-food outlets and high-street heavyweights like

Boots A boot is a type of footwear. Boot or Boots may also refer to: Businesses * Boot Inn, Chester, Cheshire, England * Boots (company), a high-street pharmacy chain and manufacturer of pharmaceuticals in the United Kingdom * The Boot, Cromer St ...

Sainsbury's J Sainsbury plc, trading as Sainsbury's, is the second largest chain of supermarkets in the United Kingdom, with a 14.6% share of UK supermarket sales. Founded in 1869 by John James Sainsbury with a shop in Drury Lane, London, the company ...

and

Tesco Tesco plc () is a British multinational groceries and general merchandise retailer headquartered in Welwyn Garden City, England. In 2011 it was the third-largest retailer in the world measured by gross revenues and the ninth-largest in th ...

. The western side of Bryn-y-Mor Road also has a number of convenience stores, hairdressers, fashion boutiques, pubs and restaurants. The area is becoming increasingly known amongst the people of Swansea for its night-life, with a number of late-night bars and restaurants having opened their doors during the early 2010s, which, along with a diverse range of independent shops and a monthly local produce market in Gwydr Square, put Uplands in TravelSupermarket's top 20 UK Hip Hang-outs in 2017. The Uplands Tavern

pub A pub (short for public house) is a kind of drinking establishment which is licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term ''public house'' first appeared in the United Kingdom in late 17th century, and was ...

however, has long been a popular venue, and was once frequented by Sir

Kingsley Amis Sir Kingsley William Amis (16 April 1922 – 22 October 1995) was an English novelist, poet, critic, and teacher. He wrote more than 20 novels, six volumes of poetry, a memoir, short stories, radio and television scripts, and works of social a ...

and Dylan Thomas, although the two writers were not residents of Uplands at the same time. The latter's childhood home on Cwmdonkin Drive has a blue plaque marking his birthplace. In 2012 the annual Do Not Go Gentle Festival was launched, hosting live music and literature across various venues, it aims to be "a festival Dylan Thomas might have liked". Uplands is a relatively salubrious area of Swansea, with property prices above the national average. Council tax rates are quite high because of this, falling into band C and above. The housing stock consists of fairly large properties; three-storey properties and properties containing four bedrooms or more are common. Many of the larger properties have been converted into student houses, making the Uplands area popular amongst students attending the city's two universities.

Governance

Though a

(civil parish) of Swansea, Uplands doesn't elect a

community council A community council is a public representative body in Great Britain. In England they may be statutory parish councils by another name, under the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007, or they may be non-statutory bodies. In ...

. The community is coterminous with an electoral ward to Swansea Council, also named Uplands. At the

2022 Swansea Council election An election to City and County of Swansea Council took place on 5 May 2022 as part of the 2022 Welsh local elections. Seventy five seats were up for election across 32 wards. The previous full election took place in 2017. Background Ward cha ...

all four councillor seats were won by the Uplands Party.

Notable buildings and landmarks

Eaton Crescent, considered to be one of the most upmarket residential areas close to Swansea's city centre, is where Conservative politician

Michael Heseltine Michael Ray Dibdin Heseltine, Baron Heseltine, (; born 21 March 1933) is a British politician and businessman. Having begun his career as a property developer, he became one of the founders of the publishing house Haymarket. Heseltine served ...

grew up. The crescent consists mainly of large three-storey semi-detached and terraced 4–6 bedroom town-houses. During the late 1980s, a large number of properties were converted for use as student houses, but since the late 1990s it has mainly returned to housing families. Stella Maris is a

convent A convent is a community of monks, nuns, religious brothers or, sisters or priests. Alternatively, ''convent'' means the building used by the community. The word is particularly used in the Catholic Church, Lutheran churches, and the Anglic ...

occupied by the Sisters of Ursulines of Jesus on Eaton Crescent. The

sisters A sister is a woman or a girl who shares one or more parents with another individual; a female sibling. The male counterpart is a brother. Although the term typically refers to a familial relationship, it is sometimes used endearingly to refer to ...

once ran the Stella Maris Primary School, a former

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

convent school that is now closed. St. James' Church, located on Walter Road, was opened in 1867 as a chapel of ease for the nearby St. Mary's in Swansea's town centre. It became a separate parish in 1985. There is a Jehovah's Witness

Kingdom Hall A Kingdom Hall is a place of worship used by Jehovah's Witnesses. The term was first suggested in 1935 by Joseph Franklin Rutherford, then president of the Watch Tower Society, for a building in Hawaii. Rutherford's reasoning was that these bui ...

on the corner of Walter Road and Mirador Crescent, and the Dharmavajra Kadampa Buddhist Centre is located in Springfield House on Ffynone Road. The Mansion House, the official residence of the Lord Mayor of Swansea, is also on Ffynone Road. The Llwyn-Y-Bryn campus of Gower College Swansea is located just off Walter Road. There are two private schools in the area; Oakleigh House provides primary education and Ffynone House provides senior education for GCSE and A-Level pupils. Local parks are Cwmdonkin Park, Rosehill Quarry Community Park, and Brynmill Park, with the former an important location and source of inspiration for Dylan Thomas, who lived so close to the park during his childhood that ''"on summer evenings I could listen, in my bed, to the voices of other children playing ball"''. Cwmdonkin Park features heavily in the radio broadcasts 'Return Journey' and 'Reminiscences of Childhood' and, most famously, the poem 'The hunchback in the park'. A memorial stone with lines from another of Thomas' poems, 'Fern Hill', was placed in the park in 1963.

Notable residents

* Dylan Thomas was born at 5 Cwmdonkin Drive in 1914 and lived there until he was 19 years old. *

(

Conservative MP This is a list of Conservative Party MPs. It includes all Members of Parliament elected to the British House of Commons representing the Conservative Party from 1834 onwards. Members of the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly or the Europea ...

) lived on Eaton Crescent during his childhood. *

, Martin Amis and Sally Amis lived at 24 The Grove in the early 1950s and later at 53 Glanmor Road in the later 1950s and early 1960s.

References

External links