The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales
The Slate Landscape of North West Wales demonstrates the transformation of the traditional rural environment of the Snowdon Mountains and Valleys by industrial slate quarrying and mining. Stretching from the top of the hill to the coast, this land presented both opportunities and constraints. Large-scale industrialisation processes undertaken by landowners and capital investors exploited these opportunities and constraints and reshaped the agricultural landscape into an industrial centre for slate production during the Industrial Revolution (1780-1914). The property consists of six sections, each of which includes surviving quarries and mines, archaeological sites associated with industrial processing of slate, historic settlements (both living and remains), historic gardens and grand country houses, ports, docks and quays, and railway and road systems, which demonstrate the functions and social connections of the surviving slate industrial landscape. The site is of international importance not only for the export of slate, but also for the export of skilled workers from the 1780s to the early 20th century. It has played a leading role in the industry, setting a model for other slate quarries around the world, and providing an important and outstanding example of the exchange of materials, technology and human values.