Greenmeadow was a working farm for over 250 years, with a farmhouse dating back to 1752 built from Welsh stone, with a traditional Welsh slate roof. The date stone above the fireplace in the cafe is original and is inscribed with the first people who lived on the farm - Edward and Anne Jones. The letter I is written as an I instead of a Jones, as before 1800s Jones was spelt Iones.
In the early 1980s, a group of local people decided to buy the farm and turn it into a Community Farm, ensuring that it would remain a green space with the team. Since then then, the farmhouse has had a number of different owners. At one point it was owned by the Adit Colliery, a local coal mining colliery. Because of the colliery’s importance to the area, the farmhouse was the first house and for many years the only house in the area to have electricity.
The layout of the farmhouse has also changed over time. The area that is now the farm shop was originally a traditional farmhouse kitchen and scullery. The storage and repair of the farm’s tractors as well as the stabling of its horses took place where the current kitchen stands and the small dairy herd were milked in the area that is now used as a hand washing facility for our visitors.
The farmhouse retains many of its original features including the beams in the café. There are several meat hooks hanging from the beams which would have traditionally been used to hang salted meat as a method of preservation prior to the invention of fridges and freezers. The bread ovens, accidentally discovered in the early 1990s, are a focal point of the café’s new bakery area.
The transformation of Greenmeadow extends many of these facilities and secures them for future use. The ambition for Greenmeadow Community Farm is that it remains a key and well-loved community asset, but also one of the best visitor destinations in South Wales.
