Greater London Industrial Archaslology Society

Newsletter June 2012

The Newsletter included a fascinating artcile about a Steam-Powered Silk Mill./p>

Silk Manufacture

The article named 3 businesses involved in silk weaving:

Operation of the Steam -Powered Mill (1873 to 1899)
- Stephen Walters & Son, 24 & 26 Wilson Street, Finsbury, EC
then
26 Cheapside EC & Sudbury, Suffolk (from 1900)

Vavasseur, Carter & Coleman, Silk Manufacturers
Redchurch Steet Conservatiomn Area

Henry Warden
Lion Mills, Hackney Road

Article in Newsletter:

Former steam-powered silk mill at 64 Tredegar Road, Bow, LB Tower Hamlets

On 8 March 2012, the LBTH Development Committee granted planning
permission to Telford Homes for the 'demolition of existing warehouse buildings',
and the erection of three blocks of flats at 64 Tredegar Road Bow E3 2EP.
Paragraph 8.63 of the officer's report (PA/10/2340) states:
'Although the existing building on site is of merit, officers consider it to be in poor
condition and have limited visual import given that it is set deep within the site.
The building is neither statutory nor locally listed and its demolition would not
have an adverse impact on the local historic environment.'
The building of merit must be the west-east, three-storey building under a pitched roof.

History:

A brief inspection (together with documentary evidence at the Tower Hamlets
Local History Library & Archives) indicates that this particular warehouse
building was erected in 1873 as a steam-powered silk mill for Stephen Walters &
Sons, silk manufacturers of 24 & 26 Wilson Street, Finsbury EC. The 1873
commercial directory records that they were manufacturers of 'umbrella, tie, velvet
and garment silks'.

A building and drainage application for a 'Factory South side of Tredegar Road
Bow', made by John Woodward, builder of 13 Wilson Street Finsbury EC, was
approved on 2 September 1873 by the Poplar District Board of Works. The register
of notices indicates that the factory was completed in December 1873.
The conjunct rate books for the south district of the Parish of St Mary, Stratford,
Bow, indicate that the Walter's factory was assigned a rateable value of £200 and
that the first payment was made on or about 30 September 1874.

The plan accompanying John Woodward's 1873 application shows the main
building (57ft 7in x 36ft 3in) with an attached engine house and lavatory block at
its south-east corner. And to the south of the engine house, a detached boiler house
with a chimney shaft and separate rooms for coke, coal and ashes against the site's
southern boundary. Also a detached foreman's house to the north. The same
configuration of buildings is shown on the 1875 and 1890 plans for S Walters &
Son factory premises (Plans of Factory Premises in the Parish of St Mary,
Stratford, Bow 1875 and 1890). And is also shown on the 1894 OS London Sheet
52, where it is labelled 'Silk Mills'.

By 1899 Walters & Sons had given up their Wilson Street premises and moved
their City premises from 12 London Wall EC to 26 Cheapside EC (1899 trades
directory). In 1900, they are recorded in the commercial directory as 'Silk
Manufacturers, umbrella and other silks' at 26 Cheapside EC and Sudbury Suffolk.
During the Second World War, the former silk mill was 'seriously damaged' (LCC
bomb damage map No. 52). And in 1949 it had doorways inserted in its west end
wall to link its three floors with a two-storey and part three-storey addition for
Tilley, Carr & Company Ltd. (March 1949 drawings; Metropolitan Borough of
Poplar minutes October 1949).

One of the 1949 drawings includes a cross-section
of the former silk mill and shows the present steel roof trusses. External evidence
indicates that the second-floor walls (above the projecting brick cornice on the
north side and east end walls) were rebuilt to take the steel roof trusses and the roof
slopes with long skylights. The concrete lintels over the first- and second-floor
window openings in the south side wall were probably inserted at the same time.
The 1949 drawings also indicate that the attached 1873 engine house and lavatory
block were demolished in 1949, together with the coal and ash storerooms.

Description:

The 1873 three-storey, London-stock-brick building with its gabled east end and
north-side elevation is clearly seen from Tredegar Road (see Fig 4 page 29 officer's
report). The north-side elevation of the five-bay building retains all its original
ground- and first-floor segmental headed window openings, with the first-floor
openings recessed under keyed segmental arches. Running under the sills of the
second-floor window openings, an original projecting brick cornice. Two of the
larger ground-floor window openings have been made into loading doorways and
(with one exception) the original iron window frames have been replaced by good
pressed-steel window frames with central opening lights.

In the east end wall near the south-east corner, and at about 8ft above ground level,
there is a 12x12 inch bricked-up opening. This probably accommodated a metal
wall box with a bearing for the main line shafting from the steam engine in the
engine house, demolished in 1949. The main line shafting would have turned
pulleys with belts driving the silk looms on the south side of the ground floor.
Other pulleys with longer belts probably transmitted rotary power to a line shafting
on the north side of the ground floor, and (via an opening in the timber floor) to
line shafting for driving silk looms on the first floor.

The second floor was probably used for the winding and warping of the thrown and dyed silk.
Also, the inspection, storage and packing of the woven silk fabric for despatch.
All the brick walls and the first-floor keystones in the north side wall are covered
with a dirty yellow Sandtex-type coating. It is probably this coating, and the
abandoned upper floors, which give the impression that the building is in 'poor condition'.

Internal inspection of the ground floor reveals a central longitudinal line of four
11ft-high circular cast-iron columns, supporting the inner ends of paired timber
floor beams spanning from the brick side walls. The ceilings in each bay retain
their original close boarding. The 1949 cross-section of the 1873 building indicates
that there are identical timber floors at first- and second-floor level. And that the
four ground-floor columns are superimposed by four first-floor columns with
timber floorbeams. Whilst the ground-floor cast-iron columns are not shown on the
plan accompanying John Woodward's 1873 application, they appear to date from
the third quarter of the 19th century.

The 1873 and 1949 plans show a building with more or less the same overall
dimensions and the same 7½ft-long window openings in the four main bays on the
ground- and first-floors. These bays are about 11ft wide and were well lighted by
the unusually large window openings. Clearly, they were designed for the
maximum daylighting of the silk looms.

Significance:

Of all the different types of silk fabric and other silk products made in the East End
during the 19th century, only umbrella silks and a proportion of serges (for lining
garments) were made in steam-powered silk mills or factories. The looms 'being
attended to entirely by girls, a few men being employed as twisters, examiners,
rubbers etc.' (Argyle, Jesse, 1893). Silk Manufacture VOL IV The Trades of East
London in Life and Labour of the People in London. Ed. Booth, Charles).
Argyle, writing in 1888, also explains that, apart from damasks (made by hand on
large looms in manufacturers' workshops) and factory-made serges, all types of
silk fabric were woven by hand in the silk weavers' own homes.

 

Trimmings such as braid and cord were also made by hand but in trimming warehouses or factories.
It is reasonable to conclude, therefore, that from 1873 to 1899 Walters & Sons
manufactured umbrella silks (and probably serges) in the steam-powered silk mill
at 64 Tredegar Road. And that their 'other silks' were made under the domestic
system, with the thrown and dyed silk collected by the handloom weavers from
Walters' other premises, to which the woven silks were returned.

One example of this type of silk manufacturers' warehouse or factory survives at
1 & 1A Old Nichol Street and 3 & 5 Turville Street in the Redchurch Street
Conservation Area – built about 1896 for silk manufacturers Vavasseur, Carter & Coleman.
They employed a large number of homeworkers and produced a wide
range of fine silks. The long building at the eastern end of Old Nichol Street has an
impressive pedimented main entrance and is the Borough's sole-surviving
representative of the 19th-century silk manufacturer's warehouse or factory.

A large group of several mostly 19th-century buildings at Lion Mills 394& 396
Hackney Road constitute the extensive former premises of Henry Warden:
trimmings manufacturer to the local furniture and clothing trades, using silk, cotton
and wool. Further research is needed, but it is likely that gas engines were installed
in the latter part of the 19th century to drive some or all of the various looms. The
group is included in the Hackney Road Conservation Area, and the buildings are
the Borough's sole surviving representatives of the 19th-century trimming
warehouse or factory.

The Borough's sole-surviving representative of the third manufacturing process in
the final stage in the history of the East End silk manufacturing industry is the
1873 steam-powered umbrella silk mill or factory at 64 Tredegar Road.
Clearly, the rebuilding of the upper walls and roof, together with the loss of the
small ancillary buildings and chimney shaft, would prevent the building from
being added to the National List. However, they do not detract from the building's
significance as a major local heritage asset in LB Tower Hamlets.

Especially as its significance is enhanced by the fact that it retains its original
internal two-storey frame of cast-iron columns and paired timber beams. A such, it
is a nationally rare example of the first stage in the transition from timber-framed
to steel-framed buildings. Furthermore, the unusually large ground- and first-floor
window openings in an industrial building of this date indicate that it was designed
for close work. And the fact that this work was the steam-powered weaving of
umbrella silk gives it regional significance as London was the country's main
centre for the manufacture of umbrellas.

Conclusions:

The 1873 steam-powered umbrella silk mill or factory at 64 Tredegar Road is not
in 'poor condition' nor does it have 'limited visual impact'. Under PPS5, it should
have been correctly identified, properly assessed and added to the Local List.
And/or included in an extension to the Medway Conservation Area.
Careful removal of the Sandtex-type coating, followed by careful cleaning would
probably reveal the yellow London stock brickwork in all its glory, and probably
complemented by red-brick segmental arches. With a new roof and suitably
refurbished and adapted for residential use, the former silk mill would make an
attractive centrepiece to Telford Homes' residential development at 64 Tredegar Road, Bow

Colin Bower
5 June 2023

Links to:

Silk Weavers named Collier - The Story So Far

Collier Family - Progress to Date