BRITISH MILLS

1, ALBERT STREET

Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places

Overview

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1296838
Date first listed:: 11-Aug-1975
List Entry Name:: BRITISH MILLS
Statutory Address:: 1, ALBERT STREET

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Date:: 2006-06-01
Reference:: IOE01/15713/04
Rights:: © Helmut Schulenburg. Source: Historic England Archive

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1296838
Date first listed:: 11-Aug-1975
Date of most recent amendment:: 28-Nov-1986
List Entry Name:: BRITISH MILLS
Statutory Address 1:: 1, ALBERT STREET
Statutory Address 2:: 80, PROSPECT HILL
Statutory Address 3:: BRITISH MILLS, PROSPECT HILL

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

Location

Statutory Address:: 1, ALBERT STREET
Statutory Address:: 80, PROSPECT HILL
Statutory Address:: BRITISH MILLS, PROSPECT HILL

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

County:: Worcestershire
District:: Redditch (District Authority)
Parish:: Non Civil Parish
National Grid Reference:: SP 04229 68101

Details

REDDITCH B PROSPECT HILL (east side) SP 0468 SW

10/139 British Mills and No 80 (formerly listed as separate 11.8.75 items)

- II

Includes No 1 and mill buildings adjoining to east Albert Street (north side). Needle and fish-hook factory with adjoining house, built for Samuel Thomas, the factory owner; now divided into offices and small factory units. c1840, with mid-C20 alterations. Stuccoed brick with shallow-pitched, hipped slate roofs behind parapets. Part two storeys, part three storeys; banded rustica- tion at ground floor level rising to moulded cornice or sill band at first floor level, and moulded eaves cornices. No 80: two storeys; three bays, central bay breaks forward and the parapet above has a shallow gable. Windows are all 12-pane sashes. Central entrance has a Distyle Doric portico with fluted columns; door has a moulded architrave, panelled reveals, half-glazed double doors and a transom light with two glazing bars. To rear right of No 80, behind a forecourt, extends a factory wing of three storeys and four bays; central two bays break forward and "the parapet above has a shallow gable; windows are 16-pane sashes on the ground and first floor and 8-pane sashes on the second floor. Two central ground floor bays occupied by semi- circular headed archway to which the rustication bands form "voussoirs". Between the first and second floor central windows is a circular moulding, possibly for a clock face originally. The wing has a six-bay west return which encloses the south side of the forecourt and its two-bay west end faces the road; similar fenestration and detailing; at the east end is a half-glazed door which has a transom light with three glazing bars. Adjoining, and, slightly set back from the west end is an additional wing, of two storeys and six irregularly spaced bays; the ground floor windows are all round-headed sashes to which the rustication bands form voussoirs; six first floor 6-pane sashes; main entrance in fourth bay has a moulded flat canopy and entablature on large pilasters; the round-headed doorway has a moulded architrave, 4- panelled door and plain fanlight; in the second bay is a large semi-circular headed archway with similar voussoir detail to the ground floor windows; above this second bay, on the roof ridge is a square lantern with four turned posts, moulded cornice and ogee domical lead roof with weathervane. Adjoining the north end of this wing, with its main front facing south, is No 1 Albert Street: mid-C19; brick with blue brick and painted stone dressings; shallow- pitched slate roof with large ridge and rear stacks; three storeys with chamfered blue brick plinth band and painted stone first floor sill band; moulded eaves cornice; four bays; windows have gauged flat heads; mainly 6-pane sashes; main entrance in second bay has a round-headed archway, C20 door and plain fanlight. Its west end is a single bay in depth and terminates the main British Mills west frontage at the south end. British Mills was one of the largest and most important needle mills in the centre of Redditch. Samuel Thomas introduced pointing-machines and the fan for drawing away the dust from the grinders' wheel at British Mills in 1843 and these methods soon become widely accepted in the region. (VCH, 3 (i), p 274; Robert Glen, Needlemakin and Urbanisation in the Redditch Area (1841-1881), Emmanuel College Cambridge, Dissertation, January 1984).

Listing NGR: SP0424668082

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:: 156615
Legacy System:: LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Doubleday, AH, Page, W, The Victoria History of the County of Worcester, (1913), 274
Glen, R, Needlemaking and Urbanisation in the Redditch Area 1841-1881

Legal

This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.