Siloah Independent Chapel was built in 1840 and enlarged/rebuilt in 1855 to the design of architect Thomas Thomas of Landore. The main gabled street front has a sophisticated design finished in render, with four giant attached classical columns (pilasters) capped by voluted or scrolled capitals in the Ionic Style. The chapel was enlarged/rebuilt again in 1904, to the design of arhitect David Jones of Llanelli. The current chapel, dated 1904, is built in the Classical Round-Headed style with a gable entry plan and Florentine-tracery window glazing. The building is Grade 2 listed.

RCAHMW, June 2009

Siloah Independent Chapel, 1855

Siloah is a particularly important surviving early work by the Independent Minister/carpenter/architect Thomas Thomas, originally from Llandeilo, who designed almost 1,000 chapels. The main gabled street front has a sophisticated design finished in render and Thomas here uses four giant attached classical columns (pilasters) capped by voluted or scrolled capitals in the Ionic Style. This contrasts with his later work in which Thomas and other Welsh chapel architects used cheaper capitals in the simpler Tuscan or Doric style. Thomas probably borrowed the idea of the large simple name and date plaque in the pediment or gable from the adjacent Bethel Chapel, built in rather similar style five years earlier. The upper window-heads all have Florentine tracery while the central arched Venetian window has its sill underneath supported on stone corbels, a distinctive design feature of Thomas chapels later also seen in Ebenezer. The central doorway was converted into a window when the two bayed ground-floor porches were added in 1903 to the design of David Jones of Llanelli, in a similar style to those he had added to Capel Als of the same congregation. The seated capacity of the chapel recorded in 1905 was 800, a good average for the Llanelli, and urban Wales, although its schoolroom capacity of 200 was fairly small compared to others in the town.

Stephen R. Hughes, RCAHMW, 06.09.2007