Author: Rhys Gregory

Big Food Festival (BFF), Wales’ independent street food and drink festival, is marking its first birthday in style with a landmark three-day event at Gnoll Country Park, Neath, from Friday 26 to Sunday 28 June 2025. Free to attend and open daily from 11am to 9:30pm, the event brings together more than 20 handpicked independent street food traders, a fully stocked bar, live entertainment, kids activities, and a warm, community-first atmosphere in one of South Wales’ most scenic outdoor venues. Every trader at BFF is independently selected, with no duplicate cuisines, and every dish is freshly cooked on site. Visitors…

Llantrisant is set to become a hotspot for the fast-growing sport of padel as Unbound Padel Ltd opens its doors with help from a £225,000 funding package from NatWest. The new club, located in Llantrisant Business Park, will become the new home for padel enthusiasts and newcomers in the area. The investment has enabled the transformation of industrial units into professionally designed, premium indoor padel courts, a welcoming café, and accessible facilities, marking a significant step forward for inclusive sport in South Wales. Since opening, Unbound Padel Club has brought five new jobs to Llantrisant and is tackling Wales’ lack…

The Heart of Wales Line Community Rail Partnership (CRP) has launched a new grant scheme with funding from Transport for Wales to encourage participation in sport and sustainable travel. The new ‘Train 2 Play’ initiative will provide grants of up to £400 to support events taking place within two miles of a station on the Heart of Wales Line, which runs from Shrewsbury to Swansea, between July 1 and October 31, 2026. Funding can be used towards costs including venue hire, coaching fees, equipment, advertising and promotional activity. Sports clubs, associations and community organisations are encouraged to develop events that…

Morgan Sindall Construction’s Wales business celebrated the opening of SEN Portfield School in Haverfordwest, marking the completion of the main phase of new build works. The £25M, 2,600sq-ft school is carbon net zero in operation. To mark the occasion, representatives from the Morgan Sindall project team and Pembrokeshire County Council gathered to the site to enjoy speeches, refreshments, and tour the school. Procured through the South West Wales Regional Contractors Framework and delivered in collaboration with engineering consultants AtkinsRéalis, the first phase of the project focused on refurbishing the existing school building. The single-storey school has been transformed to provide…

Cardiff Foodbank has launched The Great Summer Street Collection, encouraging residents across Cardiff to organise food collections where they live to help the charity that provides emergency food and support to people in crisis. This June, Cardiff residents are being invited to become local foodraisers by sharing the food bank’s most-needed items list with neighbours and acting as a collection point for donated goods. In 2025, Cardiff Foodbank provided 19,203 three-day emergency parcels for people in crisis. The initiative has been specifically developed to alleviate the seasonal drop in donations that the charity experiences. The Great Summer Street Collection aims…

Trusts are often seen as estate planning for the wealthy, but changing tax rules, care costs and family structures mean more Welsh households are asking when they make sense. Why Trusts Are Back in the Family Conversation “Setting up a trust” still sounds, to many people, like something reserved for country estates and large bank balances. In reality, trusts have long been used by UK families to manage assets, protect children, support vulnerable relatives and plan what should happen after death. In Wales, that conversation is becoming more common as families look again at property, pensions, care costs and inheritance…

With moving costs climbing and buyer expectations shifting, more Welsh homeowners are investing in the property they already own. The kitchen remains the room most likely to move a home’s value, but not every upgrade delivers the same return. The stay-and-improve calculation Across Cardiff, Caerphilly, Newport, Bridgend, the Vale of Glamorgan, the Valleys and the rest of Wales, homeowners are quietly running the same numbers. Moving home has become expensive. Land Transaction Tax (Wales’s stamp duty equivalent), legal fees, estate agent costs, removal bills and the disruption of relocating all add up. Many are choosing to stay put and invest…

For Welsh homeowners weighing up space, value and practicality, the garden room has moved beyond its early home-working reputation. It is now seen as a serious way to make an existing home work harder. The garden feature appearing across Welsh streets Walk down a Cardiff Victorian street, a Vale of Glamorgan village, a Bridgend new-build estate or a Valleys terrace in 2026, and one feature keeps appearing where it did not used to be. Not the flimsy summerhouse at the end of the lawn. The modern garden room is insulated, built, fitted with electrics and connectivity, and designed for year-round…

Census 2021 data shows clear regional patterns in Wales’s divorced and separated population, shaped by age, housing and economic pressures, plus legal issues many families only discover during separation. Wales’ divorce picture is changing Census 2021 data shows clear regional patterns in where the divorced and separated adult population is most concentrated across Welsh local authorities, shaped by demographics, housing markets, local economies and age profiles. In 2026, the legal landscape also looks different. No-fault divorce has now been in place for four years, pension inheritance tax changes are due from April 2027, and rising Welsh property values mean more…

Llangollen and Corwen Railway is set to kickstart the school Summer holidays in spectacular style with a special “Steam into Summer” event featuring two home fleet steam locomotives in action across the Dee Valley. Taking place on Saturday, July 18, 2026, the event has been specially organised to celebrate the start of the Summer holidays and will see five return services operating between Llangollen and Corwen, calling at all stations along the railway’s picturesque 10-mile route through the Dee Valley. Visitors will be able to enjoy unlimited travel throughout the day with a special Day Ranger Ticket priced online at…