The National Mountain Centre
A working national mountain centre at the village edge, where courses run daily rather than exhibits sit still.
03Story
Two churches, one saint’s name
Capel Curig takes its name from a chapel dedicated to St Curig, but the building most visitors now find beside the road is younger than that name suggests, and the village’s real growth came later, with the road itself.
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A chapel on the old road
Tradition traces the name to a 6th-century foundation by St Curig, a Celtic bishop. The building that stands today, near Plas y Brenin, is later, a small, deconsecrated church now known as St Julitta’s.
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The village outgrows its old church
As Capel Curig grew through the 19th century, a larger St Curig’s church was built in the village itself, and it was this new building that pushed the older one’s dedication to be distinguished as St Julitta’s.
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A farm, a mountain, and a society
In 1931, 21-year-old Thomas Firbank bought Dyffryn Mymbyr, the sheep farm running up the valley behind the village, and turned the experience into the bestselling memoir I Bought a Mountain. His former wife Esmé later co-founded the Snowdonia Society; the farm is now National Trust holiday cottages.
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A national centre for the mountains
Plas y Brenin grew into what is now the UK’s National Mountain Sports Centre, and Capel Curig’s identity as an outdoor-training base (climbers, canoeists, mountain rescue) has grown up around it ever since.
The village keeps the name of a 6th-century saint, and the shape of a road junction, both still visible, if you know where to look.
Atlas of Wales
