Seion Welsh Baptist Chapel was completed 1857-8 by Henry Rogers of Llanelli. It is built from squared rubble stone with extensive blue lias ashlar dressings. It has a pedimented Italianate Classical front with Tuscan pillars, plan cornice and pediment with an oval plaque inscribed 'Zion Baptist Chapel 1857'. The two-storey building has three bays to the front, the upper windows being arch-headed with moulded arches and keystones. The side elevations are plain, with sash windows, four to the west, three to the east, where the fourth bay is blocked by an attached house. Inside, the three-side panelled gallery dating from 1929 is preserved, supported on iron columns, together with original box pews. The organ recess is framed by Corinthian columns, The flat boarded ceiling is divided into panels by transverse and diagonal ribs and has central roses.

Source: Cadw Listed Buildings Record

K Steele, RCAHMW, 13 February 2009

Additional note
Zion is a well developed chapel for its 1857 date having a vestibule with stairs to 3-sided gallery and rooms at the rear for choir, deacons and minister. It has apparently original box-pews to ground and gallery, although there is some difference at the rear end of the gallery. The rear end-bay may have been heightened from an earlier lean-to, in the late 19thcentury. If so the gallery would have been smaller, as suggested by the odd arrangement of ceiling panels, the rear end being a much smaller panel, being part of the extension. The present large gallery with organ is unusual, in that it oversails the dividing wall between chapel and rear rooms. Another interestring arrangement is the baptismal tank, which extends beyond the wall behind the pulpit, though a small doorway, so that one can enter or leave the tank, already immersed in the water, out of general view. There are two sets of additional stairs at the rear, presumably for the choir. The rear rooms of the choir and Deacons have been refurbished and extended in an early-20thcentury, thinner walled, 2-storey projection at the rear gable-end. Visited, Geoff Ward,11/07/2008.