ANNE Haden is busy sweeping up a pile of builder's debris when I meet her at 5, Cwmdonkin Drive.

She goes at it like a demon. There are only 24 hours in a day. You get the impression, she is at it for pretty much most of them. She is like a woman possessed.

But with good reason, maybe. She and husband Geoff are just about to open a guest house with a difference at the Uplands property.

On Monday afternoon, the wraps will come off their three-year labour of love, and what a job they have made of it!

The house is the birthplace of Swansea's most famous son, Dylan Thomas. It is here, in the front bedroom on the first floor of the semi-detached house, that he was born.

It is here too, that some two-thirds of the writer's published works were written.

They have transformed what was a tired old wreck of a place into something very special.

Walk in and you go back the best part of a century, to 1914.

There are no televisions or radios, no phones or computer screens. Wall to wall carpeting or soft duvets on the beds? Forget it!

This is a guest house quite unlike any other.

Years of wallpaper have been peeled from the walls to discover what colour paints lay below. They have now been authentically replicated.

The furniture gathered from car boot sales to antique shops and auctions all dates to Thomas's time, while an old Belfast sink takes pride of place in the back scullery. There is lino on the floor in much of the house, with scrubbed pine boards elsewhere.

Even the lightbulbs — donated by an Austrian family who had heard about their project — come from 1920. This is about as authentic as it gets.

For £1,500 or so, up to six guests at a time will be able to enjoy the experience for a week at a time from this month.

"We want Swansea to recognise its most famous son," says straight-talking Anne.

"It is always said that Swansea turned its back on the sea. But I feel that Swansea turned its back on Dylan Thomas as well, because we never recognised him enough.

"We are business people, but we are not wealthy. The message that we are trying to develop is that if you believe in something and you are prepared to put everything you have got on the line, then do it. Because in life it's the things you don't do that you regret."

They took the job on in 2004. At the time, the house was being used by Swansea Council for literary tours. When the lease came up, the Hadens, who run Clyne Farm Activity Centre in Swansea's Mayals, made their move.

Geoff had popped in to have a look round during the previous year's Dylan Thomas Festival in the city.

"I was immediately struck by how little had been done to the house,'' he says

"There had been no real effort made to restore it, or make it look anything like a museum or anything.

"There were grey plastic-top tables with grey plastic chairs. Upstairs had a computer desk and there were some bookshelves. My comment was 'I didn't know MFI made bookshelves in 1914'."

The couple were not being unduly critical, but saw it as their chance to make something of it.

"In 2004, the council relinquished the lease and there was a bit of a hue and cry about that," said Mr Haden.

"I think, basically, they got fed up and their resources, they felt, were better put into the Dylan Thomas Centre and that is the way they moved."

So the Hadens acquired the lease on March 1, 2005.

There was plenty of work to do. In fact, there still is, despite Monday drawing ever nearer.

But the army of tradesmen working on it alongside the Hadens leave you in no doubt it will be ready for the unveiling, on what would have been Dylan's 94th birthday.

"We want to be true to the house and we want to be true to the family that lived in the house," says Anne.

"They weren't rich and we don't want to create that kind of a house.

"When we first started on the work, it wasn't the warm and happy place it once had been. But I think we have built that back into it.

"I am ecstatic with the results and I think people who see it for themselves will be too.''

The Hadens admit to becoming very defensive of Thomas and his much written-about exploits since taking on the job of restoring his old home.

"Too often, he is spoken of in a negative way rather than positive,'' they add.

"We now see him as somebody who wasn't an alcoholic, but rather someone who could hold his drink. He would have a great time visiting Wind Street in Swansea today!"

The property, set on a hill overlooking many of the same slate roofs and chimney pots that Dylan would have seen from his bedroom, is in the shadow of Cwmdonkin Park, which Thomas called his "railinged universe".

The Hadens won't say how much cash they have invested in the place. Going on the results however, it is likely to have been considerable.

It is the Americans who are at the front of the queue to stay there, although there is interest in their project from both Europe and much closer to home too.

The £1,500 weekly bill can rise depending on packages that can be built into any stay, such as the use of a housekeeper each day and delivery of fresh produce. The visitors may see a milkman delivering bottles and a baker calling there. They will even be able to hire old-style bikes, or a classic car. The attention to detail is incredible.

None of the furniture actually belonged to the Thomas family. But it almost doesn't matter, such is the way the house has been recreated.

There are occasional images of his work on some walls. Others are hidden away, to be found by visitors.

What would Dylan himself have made of it all?

Geoff says: "I think he would have had a good laugh, and probably written a poem or play about it all at the same time.

"But he would have liked the end result. Of that I am sure.''