Details
646-1/0/10041 ST ANN'S HILL ROAD
14-FEB-06 Oldknow's Factory
II
Lace factory complex and attached area railings, known as Oldknow's factory. The complex comprises two linked factory ranges and a separate ancillary building, currently in use as studios, offices, workshops and for textile manufacturing. Egerton Street range, c1850, for Lymbery, lace manufacturer; St Ann's Hill Road range, c1855 for Hartshorn & Oldknow, lace manufacturers. Warehouse additions and separate ancillary building later C19. Brick, with brick and ashlar dressings and low pitched slate roofs, mostly behind parapets.
Egerton Street factory. L-shaped range. 4 storeys plus basement; bullnose brick eaves course. Fenestration is generally shallower than the St Ann's Hill Road range. Windows are a mixture of slender timber and metal framed glazing bar casements with bullnose brick surrounds and stone sills. 18 window range, interrupted on ground-floor by central cart entrance, with wooden surround extending up to arched head at first-floor level with glazing bar casement infill. Small pitched roof over 2 centre bays with circular clock fronts-piece. Lift addition to front left. Rear has regular fenestration with loft door at second-floor level to left of the entrance block, which projects slightly forward with a clock on the return face. Right of this is a pentagonal stair and chimney stack tower. The southern 5 window range has been raised; on the street facade, it has 4 windows at ground and first-floor levels.
Interior: The floors are carried on timber beams supported by cast-iron columns. The ground-floor columns have cast in mounts for line shafting.
Factory, fronting to St Ann's Hill Road, between Egerton Street and Alfred Street North. Single range, with projecting blocks at each end. 5 storeys plus basement with 4 storeys plus basement in northern half; first-floor sill band and dentillated brick eaves course. Windows are mainly original metal glazing bar casements with wedge lintels. The St Ann's Hill Road frontage has regular fenestration of 29 windows, arranged 1: 24: 4, with loft doors in the right bay. Frontage embellished with a metal spearhead railing mounted on a stepped brick plinth with ashlar coping. Regular fenestration to the rear, with loft doors in the left bay. Central pentagonal stair tower with clock, enclosing a circular chimney stack. Warehouse addition, at the south end of the main range, has first-floor sill band and regular fenestration over 5 storeys plus basement. Acute corner at the junction of St Ann's Hill Road and Alfred Street North is expressed in curved brickwork, with a window on each floor in a curved metal frame. Smaller addition, to the north of the main range, has mainly sash windows and first floor sill band. 4 storeys; 4 x 1 windows with a loft door on the second-floor.
Interior: engine room has ribbed cast iron cross beams and brackets. Upper floors have wooden floors and cross beams with tie rods, carried on cast iron columns with lineshaft mountings. Top floor has thinner columns. Roof not visible. Warehouse addition has similar columns without lineshaft mountings.
Warehouse to east of Oldknow's and Clarke's factory, now workshops, c1880. Brick with incomplete Bulwell stone plinth and ashlar and moulded brick dressings. Windows are mainly original cast iron glazing bar casements. 3 storeys. Triple gabled front to street has a 6 window range with cart opening to the right with a wooden lintel. To its left, 3 windows, then a door. Above, regular fenestration on 2 floors. All these windows have wedge lintels. Left return has 4 windows. Right return, with the stone plinth, has a blind basement, and above, 2 segment-arched windows on each floor. To the right, on the second-floor, 3 narrower windows.
Sources:
Eaton, M, Buildings of the Machine Lace and Hosiery Industries of the East Midlands, draft report, 1997.
Palmer, M & Neaverson, P, Industrial Landscapes of the East Midlands, 1992, p.146.
Mason, S, Nottingham Lace 1760s-1950s, 1994, p.217.
Goad's Insurance Plans, 1892, sheet 19.
Salmon's plan of Nottingham, 1861.
History:
The factory complex dates to the early 1850s. The Egerton Street factory appears to be earlier, with lesser floor to ceiling heights. This was built for the lacemaker, Frederick Lymbery and was later occupied by Clarke & Sons lace dressers, bleachers and dyers. The last recorded lacemaker in this building was Henry & Joseph Turner in 1932. The factory fronting St Ann's Hill Road was first occupied by lace manufacturer Hartshorn & Oldknow. James Oldknow patented the use of perforated steel patterning bars in 1849 and had a factory with Maillot in Lille, France. In 1860, Oldknow was elected Alderman to the town council for St. Ann's Ward, no doubt a reflection of his position as a successful businessman. This was followed by three stints as Lord Mayor, in 1869, 1878 and 1879. As chairman of the 'Castle Committee' he was largely responsible for the development of the Nottingham Castle Museum and Art Gallery, England's first municipal art gallery, which opened in 1878. He was knighted by Queen Victoria in the same year and died in 1888. He lived in Villa Road, close to the factory and was buried at the nearby Rock Cemetery, Mansfield Road. After 1905, the only listed occupiers of the factory were yarn merchants. Today, the building is largely occupied by recording and artists studios.
Summary of Importance:
Oldknow's factory fulfills the criteria for listing as a well proportioned and imposing example of a largely unaltered mid-C19 lace factory complex retaining some distinctive and unusual features typical of lace-making factories in the area. It is strongly associated with Nottingham born James Oldknow, a significant figure in the lace-making business and in the city itself.
