Belle Vue Park is a large Victorian public park on the west side of Newport.

The land on which the park stands was a gift to Newport from Godfrey Morgan, 1st Viscount Tredegar in 1891 to provide a public park for its citizens.

In November 1892 Lord Tredegar performed the ceremony of cutting the first sod and construction began. The park opened on 8th September, 1894. The final cost of the park is recorded as £19,500.

The Park has many features typical of a Victorian public park, including the conservatories and pavilion, bandstand and rockeries.

Additional features were added to the park throughout the years. The Gorsedd Stone Circle was erected in 1896, for the National Eisteddfod, held in Belle Vue Park in 1897. The bowling greens were opened in 1904 and a Tea House added in 1910.

The bandstand and original series of cascades were restored in 2006.

Belle Vue Park contains a number of rare flora specimens. In spring the Himalayan Magnolias produce huge goblet-shaped pink flowers and the branches of the Judas Trees can be seen covered with clusters of rose-lilac flowers in May. In June and July the Tulip Tree produces its distinctive orange tulip-shaped flowers.

 

Autumn brings glorious leaf colour to many of the trees and shrubs. Of particular note are the clear yellow leaves of Ginkgo biloba, one of only four deciduous conifers that can be seen growing in the British Isles today, and the glorious crimson leaves of the Liquidambar, a native of the eastern United States.