Joseph Wood Hat makers Manchester 0423

[Bignickb]

Only a week before I was telling someone how I'd love to see the inside of this building, it has been one of my favourite structures in Manchester for ages!
And - by pure chance, I got an opportunity to fulfil my dream! I took the pics with my phone because running home for my camera and gear was not an option, it was a Now or never scenario.
I couldn't find much info on this place, unfortunately; it was built in 1907 and ran as a Hat factory and hosiery makers!
Built by C Clegg it had three floors with large windows to allow maximum light for the workers.
Up until lockdown it had been a hostel but sadly did not survive, it has been sold and now awaits decisions on it's future. It's not listed but should developers try to remove it and plan to put up a sterile, cheap build tower block - public outcry would prevail. And rightly so!
It's in good condition; not too much damp and certainly no signs of copper thieves.

On with the pics:

Ornate sinks.


Big showers.


Down


I Loved these ceilings!


Old style Loo




Up in the god's!










Grim wallpaper!


Central lift


Centre view




I was unsure of the stability so I spent minimal time on these. Plus - I was in full view!




Outside! Isn't it Beautiful!

 

[Electric]

Wow, what a frontage. No wonder the locals love it! Is it me or are the proportions just a bit mad?

 

[Hayman]

Wow, what a frontage. No wonder the locals love it! Is it me or are the proportions just a bit mad?

I think you are right. A bit like the difference in sizes of the wheels on a penny-farthing.

 

[Electric]

I think you are right. A bit like the difference in sizes of the wheels on a penny-farthing.

Spot on. As if you'd usually expect a factory building of that age to be wider than it is high.

 

[Hayman]

Spot on. As if you'd usually expect a factory building of that age to be wider than it is high.

From the internet: "Charles Clegg was born in 1828. He was articled to the architect Edwin Shellard and set up his own practice in 1851. Seven years later he entered into a partnership with John Knowles and by 1868 they had offices in Manchester and Blackpool. In 1882 Clegg's son Charles joined the firm. In a city with a large number of elegant warehouses, the name of Clegg and Knowles is associated with many of the best". The photos show more conventional buildings. but all with plenty of windows. The one here is not among those illustrating their work.

Given the Dutch look to the very top, might there have been a derrick for lifting items in through the uppermost windows, so that whatever was dealt with in the building passed down from floor to floor. The arch over the ground-level front right hand side suggests an opening for carts to back into. Was it a mill of some type?

 

[Bignickb]

This is the actual shape of the building, this was displayed on site!

 

[Hayman]

This is the actual shape of the building, this was displayed on site!

Thanks. I see there is a lift. As the place was built in 1907, there almost certainly was a lift of some sort from the start, for merchandise and people. A school that I attended around 1950 was in a building that dated from the early 1800s, and it had a counter-balance lift worked by pulling on a rope in a corner of the lift car.

 

[Bignickb]

Thanks. I see there is a lift. As the place was built in 1907, there almost certainly was a lift of some sort from the start, for merchandise and people. A school that I attended around 1950 was in a building that dated from the early 1800s, and it had a counter-balance lift worked by pulling on a rope in a corner of the lift car.

I saw the lift machinery when I was on the roof, it will be working so disabled travellers could get to the upper floors. We were on limited time so we never tried it.

 

[wolfism]

Very nice, liking the mix of red brick and faience tiling. It's like a piece of Queen Anne style architecture on steroids, and just like jewellery workshops or potteries, the huge windows will let in enough natural light for the hat makers to see what they're doing.

 

[Hayman]

I saw the lift machinery when I was on the roof, it will be working so disabled travellers could get to the upper floors. We were on limited time so we never tried it.

Was it electric or 'mechanical'? The rope-operated lift in Haccombe House, near Newton Abbot, which was then a boarding school was definitely 'mechanical'.

Of course, what you saw may not have been the original lift. Did it have a feel of being Edwardian - i.e., from 1907 when the place was constructed?

 

[Hayman]

Very nice, liking the mix of red brick and faience tiling. It's like a piece of Queen Anne style architecture on steroids, and just like jewellery workshops or potteries, the huge windows will let in enough natural light for the hat makers to see what they're doing.

Do not forget that the expression 'mad hatter' came from hat makers using mercury-based products in the curing of the felt used to make hats. Perhaps, by 1907, they were no longer in use. But, thinking of the radio-active paint used on luminous watch dials - radium - still in use in the 1960s, maybe there were 20th century mad hatters.

 

[Roderick]

Really well done! I enjoyed that very much. I hope the metal thieves don't find it.