Cardiff Castle

Painting, gouache on board, Cardiff Castle by Ronald Lampitt, 1960. Depicts the view looking over Cardiff Castle, with the clock tower and walls in the foreground, and the castle keep beyond. In the background are Cathays Park, City Hall and the National Museum of Wales. Original artwork for British Railways (Western Region) poster in the Travel by Train series.

Cardiff Castle, by Ronald Lampitt, original artwork for a British Railways Western Region poster, 1960.

The poster depicts Cardiff Castle in the capital city of Wales. The first castle in Cardiff was built by the Normans in the late eleventh century. It was then rebuilt in stone and extended during the medieval wars between the Welsh and Anglo-Normans. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the castle was extensively rebuilt in the Gothic revival style by its owners, the Marquesses of Bute. In 1947 the Bute family gave the castle to the City of Cardiff.

Ronald Lampitt was born in Worcester in 1906. He was a self-taught commercial artist and illustrator, who produced artworks for John Bull magazine, The Sunday Times, Reader's Digest and other publications. He worked on children's books in collaboration with his brother-in-law, Henry Deverson and illustrated nine Ladybird books and the magazine Look and Learn.

Lampitt produced posters and carriage prints for the Great Western, Southern and London, Midland & Scottish Railways and later for British Railways. Lampitt was paid 150 guineas (£157.50) for his Cardiff Castle artwork. He died in 1988.