The Drama Association of Wales was founded in 1934, a registered charity since 1973 and was core funded by the Arts Council of Wales

Arts Council of Wales

The Arts Council of Wales is a Welsh Government sponsored body, responsible for funding and developing the arts in Wales.Established by Royal Charter in 1946, as the Welsh Arts Council , when it merged with the three Welsh regional arts associations...

 from 1974 to 2011. The function of DAW is to increase opportunities for people in the community to be creatively involved in drama. This is supported through the provision of training, new writing initiatives and access to an extensive lending library containing plays, play-sets and technical theatre books.

In April 1991, DAW acquired the British

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 Theatre Association playsets, making the association the world’s largest specialist English language

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

 lending library.

DAW plays an active role as part of the National Festival of Community Theatre

National Festival of Community Theatre

-History:The NFCT, established in 1927, is a celebration of amateur theatre at local, national and UK level. Each year, the national amateur organisations in the home nations promote a series of one-act play festivals and, through various eliminating rounds, take part in the final stage, the...

, with seven regional festivals held throughout Wales between March and May.