Fazeley Mill Fazeley near Tamworth

To Iron Founders etc. Persons desirous of tendering for the wrought and cast iron work required in the erection of a SMALLWARE MILL Fazeley near Tamworth are requested to forward their names to the Architects not later than Friday 27th inst. Potts  Pickup and Dixon 1 Princess Street Manchester and Clegg Street, Oldham.

LISTING TEXT -Textile factory. 1886, with minor C20 alterations. Built for William Tolson Ltd, by Messrs Wattons of Lichfield. Red brick with ashlar sandstone dressings and a shallow, double-pitched roof set behind a low parapet. PLAN: linear form, aligned north-south and parallel to the Birmingham and Fazeley canal to the west, with the main weaving block having a small attached engine house at the north end with an associated boiler house and a chimney incorporated in the body of the mill, around which is constructed the principal mill stair. EAST ELEVATION: 5-storey weaving block of 29 bays, with pilasters to the corners and shallow arched-headed windows with C20 frames to all storeys. Cill band to top floor windows. Bay 3 at the north end has taking-in doorways above ground floor level and hoist beam to top floor door head. North end bay, (which incorporated the powered rope race) is lit by 2 windows to each floor on the gable wall, unlike the south end which has 4 windows to each floor. Single bay engine house attached at north end of 2 storeys with corner pilasters and a single tall window with a semi-circular arched head. Further north and set back, a low boiler house with small roof louvres. INTERIOR: high ground floor with central colonnade of cast-iron columns supporting metal H-section beam, which itself carries metal cross beams. The moulded heads to the columns are clasped by semi-circular ends of the spine beam sections. Upper floor beams carry mountings for line shafting. Ceiling beams to upper floor are of timber. Internal staircase at north end winds around enclosed stack, within a brick-walled compartment, and is made up of stone steps with pierced cast-iron risers. Fazeley Mill is a little altered example of a late C19 textile factory, specifically designed for the manufacture of narrow fabric. It displays the structural characteristics of metal framed construction typical of the period, and represents the ongoing significance of the local textile industry established by the Peel family in Fazeley in the late C18

Reference    Manchester Guardian 11 February 1882 page 10 – contracts
Reference    Manchester Guardian 14 February 1882 page 1 – contracts
Reference    Manchester Guardian 16 February 1882 page 1 – contracts