Quarry Bank Mill and Styal Estate near Manchester is one of the most important industrial heritage sites in England. The first Mill was built in 1784. The site includes a cotton mill with working machinery, a restored Apprentice House, a mill workers’ village and a country estate. The working waterwheel is the most powerful in Europe. It is fed by the River Bollin which flows behind the Mill. The Great Wheel is 32 feet in diameter and 21 feet wide. The wheel ran until 1904 when it was replaced by a steam engine. It provided energy to the mill machinery and kept the weaving looms and spinning mules running. Quarry Bank Mill was run by the owner’s family until it was passed to the National Trust in 1939. The Mill was closed in 1952. By the 1960s the building was crumbling. The renovation works were undertaken to save the Mill. It was developed into a museum of the cotton industry. The Mill was opened to the public in 1978. Visitors experience hands-on exhibits and demonstrations into how cotton is processed into cloth. You see how traditional spinning and weaving was transformed through the ingenuity of early textile engineers.

In 1790 there were 260 men, women and children working at the Mill. By 1831 the number had increased to 450. For most people of today it is difficult to imagine what working in a mill was like. Noise, accidents, twelve hours a day and six days a week of repetitive work were part of the industrial life of the workforce.

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