Summary
Prospect Mill is a former woollen mill of the third quarter of the nineteenth century, constructed in stone with slate roofs.
Reasons for Designation
Prospect Mill, a former woollen mill of 1883, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* Industrial context: Prospect Mill illustrates an important phase in the development of the nationally important woollen textile industry of West Yorkshire;
* Architectural Interest: the architecture of the mill is coherent and impressive, designed by a known architect, and the form of the buildings clearly reflects their functions with good survival of external and internal features;
* Survival: apart from the chimney, the original buildings of the mill, including spinning mill, engine room, boiler house and warehouse, survive with relatively few modern additions;
* Group value: Prospect Mill forms a group with North Dean Mill immediately to the west, enhancing the special interest of both complexes.
History
The steam powered worsted spinning mill was designed by Richard Horsfall of Halifax for George Ingham of Ingham and Robinson and is dated 1883. Ingham and Robinson also ran Hollyns Mill in Elland. The mill had a four-belt drive engine made by Pollot and Wigsell of Sowerby Bridge. Plans dated 1883 for the mill show a slightly different internal layout from that which was actually constructed, though the main elements are present.
The small weaving shed was added in the beginning of the twentieth century and shown on the O.S 1:2500 map of 1907. In 1912 two boilers were installed with further work in 1954. The engines were probably scrapped soon after electric power was installed in 1970. The site is still marked as a mill on the 1:10000 O.S. map of 1983-90 and is currently in use as storage for a packaging firm. The chimney has been lost within the last ten years.
Details
Prospect Mill is a former textile mill of 1883 with early twentieth century additions, designed by Richard Horsfall of Halifax.
MATERIALS: the mill is constructed of coursed gritstone with a blue slate roof.
PLAN: the multi-storey spinning mill is aligned approximately north-south, with the former engine house within the body of the main building at the north end and the boiler house alongside on the east side. A small warehouse is attached at the southern end of the west side, and a north-lights shed extends north from this, ending at the north end in a single storey block projecting beyond the end of the spinning mill.
EXTERIOR: Spinning Mill: the mill has five storeys and 22 bays, and is five bays deep. A ramped parapet at either end conceals the double span roof which has skylights on the west side of the eastern span. The north end parapet bears the name PROSPECT MILL and the date 1883. There are three round arched windows on the ground floor of the north end, identifying the former engine house. The eaves are dentilled with a lower band and dependant iron rings above each window. The mill windows are three-light timber framed, tall on the lower four storeys and squarer on the top floor, with projecting cills. There is a taking-in door on the first floor north elevation and a line of taking in-doors in the centre of the south elevation with an entrance on the ground floor. On the east side in the centre is a projecting privy tower with small windows to the south side, extending beyond the roof line with two windows on each side above a continuation of the main roof dentil course, and a pyramidal roof. On the west side, at the junction with the warehouse, is a larger, taller stair and water tank tower. It has windows on the north side and string courses and single windows to each floor on the west side up to the height of the mill, and four stages above roof height topped by a water tank. The main roof dentilled course is continued round the tower, with another dentilled course above the third stage, with the other stages defined by plain string courses. There are single windows on the west and south sides of the second stage.
Warehouse: the warehouse has a double hipped roof and has three storeys. It is four bays long and three bays deep, extending in one build from the south end of the spinning mill. The windows and dentils are the same as those of the mill.
Weaving shed: the north lights shed has nine short bays from north to south, of the same width as the warehouse. The west side has a low stone wall below a glazed upper wall, and replaced glazing and flashing, with some original corrugated asbestos roofing.
Boiler house: the single storey boiler house has a hipped roof with a flat-roofed extension to the east with two blocked windows. The east elevation has four tall windows and there is an inserted vehicle entrance on the north elevation. To the south is a later, narrower section with a pitched roof that has a door and two blocked windows on the west side and a large vehicle entrance on the south gable end. The chimney formerly stood at the end of the boiler house but has now gone.
INTERIOR: Spinning mill: the ground floor has an open space where the engine was housed and the former single storey office area was. The remainder of the floor has a double row of cast iron columns with bolting heads for line shafting running down the centre. The floor is timber as are the supporting beams for the floor above. This pattern is repeated for each floor. The roof structure, open on the top floor, is a timber queen post construction. The stairs within the stair tower have been capped on the lower floors to repair worn treads.
Weaving shed: the shed has metal frames to the roof which has replaced glazing to the roof and upper west wall. There are window openings to west wall of the adjacent spinning mill, originally an external wall.
Warehouse: the ground floor of the warehouse has some timber partitions indicating its use as an office, and indications of a former canteen on the first floor.
Boiler house: the boiler house has an inserted roof and no visible features. The extension has an open metal frame roof structure.
