A care organisation has started recruiting staff for a new centre of excellence for dementia care in Gwynedd.

Pendine Park is creating 100 jobs at the £7 million complex at the site of the former Bryn Seiont community hospital on the outskirts of Caernarfon.

Construction work is on track and Canolfan Gofal Bryn Seiont (Bryn Seiont Care Centre) is due to open in September this year.

The pioneering centre is the brainchild of Mario and Gill Kreft, the proprietors of the award-winning Pendine Park who say it will be the perfect way to celebrate the organisation’s 30th anniversary.

They already employ more than 600 people in seven care homes in Wrexham, which cater for a variety of needs, a domiciliary care company and their own in-house training company.

According to the couple, the bilingual centre and 16 extra care apartments to enable couples to stay together and people to stay independent will provide “world class” facilities.

Mr Kreft is the Chair of Care Forum Wales, the main representative body for the care sector in Wales, and was awarded an MBE for his contribution to social care in Wales.

The model for Canolfan Gofal Bryn Seiont is a development of their centre in Wrexham which was officially opened First Minister Carwyn Jones in 2010.

There, the Bodlondeb care home is divided into eight small, family-like units so that the residents receive individual care and attention while benefiting from the back-up of a larger organisation.

In 2010 Bodlondeb was named the best new dementia care facility in Britain at the UK Over 50s Housing Awards.

Mr Kreft said: “The builders are very confident that they can meet the deadlines that we have to hand over the first phase of the development by the end of September.

“Recruitment has already started and we’re currently in informal discussions with a number of people about senior roles and we’ve also had a very successful jobs fair in Caernarfon with the Jobs Centre.

“We are all very encouraged by the goodwill and support we’ve received and I think the fact that it’s a new development and a new way of doing things interests people, not least because of Bryn Seiont’s history as a hospital providing care to the community.

“Our whole ethos at Pendine Park is very much to develop that sense of ownership and we want people to join the team, both those that are already qualified, and also we see the opportunity to develop people who see social care as a career possibility with real prospects.

“For example, in Wrexham we are working with the Prince’s Trust to encourage young people to work in social care and get qualifications.

“We’re trying to create something really special at Canolfan Gofal Bryn Seiont, something that really hasn’t been done in quite the way before as part of a fully bilingual facility in a predominately Welsh speaking part of Wales.

“We already have an Investors in People gold award in Wrexham and this is something we would like to extend to Caernarfon, using our own training company, Smartcare.

“Our challenge at Bryn Seiont is to recruit people who want to buy into this concept of creating a community care centre, with high quality domiciliary care at the heart of it.

“Canolfan Gofal Bryn Seiont is going to be so much more than a care home. We’re going to work with Bangor University, with colleges in further education and with the community and it is going to have a whole range of services that not everybody would expect to be provided in North West Wales.

“We’re very keen to provide day care and respite services. They’re very dear to our hearts because that’s how Gill and I came into the sector in 1985 because we couldn’t find suitable care for my grandmother.

“We hope that the opening of Bryn Seiont will be the jewel in the crown of our 30^th year.

“Our priority is to provide what we call relationship centred care. We want to work with the community, with commissioners, with regulators and actually put the families, our residents, our future residents and the staff at the heart of what we do at Bryn Seiont.

“We want to embody this real sense of ownership where people feel they own a service, they feel a part of it and they feel valued and then the service will be so much better.

“The arts will play an important part of life in Bryn Seiont as they do at all our other homes and we are keen to support community based arts initiatives.

“We have had an artist in residence for more than 20 years and we are involved in long running partnerships with both the world-renowned Hallé orchestra and Welsh National Opera.

“We’ve had a phenomenal degree of support from the community right across the range and we hope to take that forward and work with the community.

“We will be a bilingual community based organisation, serving the needs of individuals and their families and trying to ensure that people get the very best care.”

An eco-friendly housing development that’s helping to breathe new life into a former slate quarrying village in Snowdonia has won a major national award.

The £730,000 Maes y Waen scheme in Penmachno in Conwy was named as the Development of the Year at the Welsh Housing Awards.

The prize was awarded jointly to housing association Cartrefi Conwy, Conwy County Borough Council and Conwy Rural Housing Enabler who were partners in the project.

As well as the excellent quality of the design and construction, the judges also praised the development for helping to safeguard the future of the village school as well as the Welsh language and culture.

The six affordable family houses have ensured that local families can stay in the village rather than having to move away from the area.

The four three-bedroom properties and two two-bedroom properties were built by construction firm R.L. Davies.

The scheme was the first social housing development in the village for 40 years.

Cartrefi Conwy decided to press ahead with the scheme after a survey by the Conwy Rural Housing Enabler showed a clear need to meet local demand.

According to Andrew Bowden, the Chief Executive of Cartrefi Conwy, receiving the award was a proud moment.

He said: “Cartrefi Conwy set out to deliver the Welsh Quality Housing Standard by improving all our existing properties and we did that on time – the next milestone for us was to start to build new, affordable homes in the county of Conwy.

“It’s absolutely fantastic news that we were able to do our first scheme in a rural community, within the Snowdonia National Park, very much working the Rural Housing Enabler and the Community Council to ensure that our development suited the needs of the local community.

“We are now advised that our development will help sustain the local school as well as the local Welsh culture and language which again is important to Cartrefi Conwy.

“We used modern methods of construction to ensure high insulation standards and they have solar panels and air source heat pumps as well.

“The homes have many modern features and have  been designed as ‘lifetime homes’ making the homes fully accessible for disabled tenants or older people.”

Cllr Phil Edwards, the cabinet member with responsibility for housing at Conwy Council, said: “I am proud our partnership has led to the winning of this prestigious award.

“The most important thing is that we provide housing for local people so that they can stay in their community which helps the community stay alive for the future.

“We are moving the game forward in terms of social housing. There has been too long a period where there was no provision like this for the communities and this has raised the bar for the future.

“The scarcity of affordable homes especially in the heart of the countryside means that people have to move away to get work.

“We have to break that vicious circle and make sure that we work for our communities by providing housing and by enabling people to stay in their communities and then helping them to find work.”

Among the tenants at Maes y Waen is mother-of-three Rachel Wainwright, who was born and brought up in Penmachno.

She is thrilled with her new home and says that without it the family would probably have had to move away from the village because the rented accommodation they were living in was up for sale.

Rachel explained: “It was really important that we were able to stay in Penmachno. My family are all here and they look after the children when I work.

“The children are used to being here and they’ve got a lot of friends in the village so it’s really nice now just hearing them play outside with their friends in the street. They’ve never had that before so it’s really good.

“The house is brilliant, it’s really lovely. I would never have been able to get something like this without Cartrefi Conwy.”

According to Brian Roberts, Chair of Cartrefi Conwy’s Development Committee, the development marked the beginning of a new chapter for the organisation.

He said: “The Maes y Waen development is the first of many. We are planning to build a lot more affordable homes over the next few years.”

Conwy Council’s Rural Housing Enabler, Buddug Williams, said: “It’s great that a development in such a rural area can win such a prestigious award.”

It was a sentiment echoed by quantity surveyor Chris Jones, from construction firm R.L. Davies, who said: “I’m very proud. The award is testament to a great team effort and shows how hard everyone has worked.”

David Lowe, Conwy Council’s Affordable Housing Development Officer, added: “This development supports the local community, helps keep the local school going and helps make the community more sustainable. It is a great achievement that the partnership working that underpinned and delivered this housing project helped us gain such national recognition.”