Portland Works

Portland Works is a purpose-built cutlery works, now used as workshops, constructed in the late 1870s with minor early 20th-century additions. The complex is built of red brick with stone and white brick dressings, brick stacks, and slate roofs.

Layout and Plan

The works occupies an obtuse-angled corner site at the junction of Randall Street and Hill Street, arranged around a courtyard. The front range curves around the north side, following both street frontages, with workshop ranges extending back from either end to flank the east and west sides of the yard. The narrow west range is angled to follow the site boundary. At the rear of the yard stands a deep workshop range with three original buildings projecting into the courtyard from its centre. An octagonal industrial chimney rises on the west side of the yard, and a number of later buildings occupy the courtyard.

Front Range

The front building is two storeys high with a plinth, dentilated wooden eaves, and coped gables. A covered cart entrance near the road junction divides the front elevation into two functional sections. Both the cart entrance and the room above share a decorative ashlar surround with rusticated jambs, a deep lintel, and a round-arched triple hung-sash window without glazing bars. These are flanked by panelled pilasters beneath a rendered gabled parapet bearing the works' name, flanked by panelled pedestals with ball finials. A ridge stack rises above. Single narrow hung-sash windows without glazing bars flank the first-floor pilasters.

To the right of the cart entrance, the office and showroom range extends along Randall Street for fifteen regular bays with stone sill bands and a cogged first-floor band. Ground-floor windows have white brick segmental heads, while first-floor windows have white brick round-arched heads. All are hung-sash windows with two-over-two glazing bars. Recessed panels of decorative brickwork appear beneath the upper windows. The sixth bay to the right of the cart entrance contains the main entrance doorway—a panelled double door with overlight, raised by three steps and set in an ashlar surround with a cornice supported on fluted brackets. The range has two ridge stacks and a gable stack. The yard elevation features a shallow two-storey wing projecting into the courtyard, housing toilets.

The range curving into Hill Street contains workshops and possibly a house. The bays are not clearly defined, with irregularly spaced windows. It has stone sill bands, a first-floor cogged band, and window detailing matching the east side of the cart entrance, except for two ground-floor windows and a rectangular barred opening at the west end, which have chamfered stone sills and lintels. There is one original doorway with overlight and white brick segmental head, one window converted to a doorway, and two inserted doorways. Three ridge stacks are present. The yard elevation features an original external cantilevered stone staircase to the first floor and two-light multi-paned casements.

West Workshop Range

The west side of the yard has a three-storey workshop range built of brick in English bond with a double-pitched slate roof. The south-west gable is built up and over the street frontage building. The ground floor contains nine individual hand forge shops, many with alterations to the original door and window arrangement. The northernmost forge shop retains its original appearance most completely, with a stable-type split door and an adjoining two-light, small-paned casement window sharing a common wooden frame under a single lintel. The lintels throughout are rolled steel joists. The first and second floors have eighteen bays of closely spaced two-light multi-paned casements. The windows have shaped brick sills—those on the first floor with segmental arched heads, and straight heads to the second-floor windows situated directly under the eaves. The fifth bay from the south-west gable contains an inserted loading door and hoist. An original external stone staircase stands at the north end of the building. Brick eaves stacks are present on the rear wall.

Rear Workshop Range

The rear of the yard features a deep range of three storeys, reduced to two storeys in the central section due to fire damage. It is built of brick with stone sill bands and a double-pitched slate roof. The ground-floor elevation has been altered by modern insertion of wide openings with metal rollers. The first and second floors have closely spaced two-light multi-paned casements, some having lost their original glazing, with segmental arched brick lintels. Brick ridge stacks are present.

A tall single-storey building projects into the yard from the midpoint of the rear range, with lower single-storey buildings attached to each side. The central and eastern buildings show later alterations. A truncated octagonal industrial chimney stands on the west side of the yard.

East Workshop Range

The east side of the yard has a three-storey building with a partial basement at the south end. It is built of brick in English Garden Wall bond, with a blind rear wall, mono-pitch slate roof, stone coping, shaped stone kneelers, and brick roof and ridge stacks. The courtyard elevation has nineteen bays with closely spaced two-light multi-paned casements on all floors, many on the ground floor having lost their original frames. The windows have segmental arched heads, with stone sills and a partial sill band over the basement on the ground floor, and sill bands on the upper floors. Some ground-floor windows have been converted to doorways. An external staircase stands at the north end of the building.

Later Additions

In the early 20th century, a two-storey brick workshop was built against and over the south end of the single-storey buildings in the yard. A workshop was constructed on rolled steel joists at first-floor level against the north side of the cart entrance. A freestanding single-storey brick workshop stands south of the chimney.

Interior

The ground floor of the rear range and the single-storey central building projecting into the yard have been inspected. The ground floor is constructed with brick fireproof ceilings supported by iron columns and rolled steel joists. Midway along the range is a room where, unlike the rest of the building, the four fireproof bays run transversely. A large bearing box in one of the side walls suggests this was the engine house. To the west of the engine house are two four-bay rooms. At the south end of the central building is a large arched brick opening, probably a fireplace arch of a reheat hearth for a power forge housing steam hammers.

Historical Context

The 1851 Ordnance Survey map at 1:1056 scale shows the Highfield area of Sheffield as undeveloped fields. Portland Works is first mentioned in a trade directory of 1879 and appears largely in its present form on the 1889 Ordnance Survey map at 1:500 scale. The works was occupied by R F Mosley, a cutlery manufacturer, whose firm was still listed at the premises over forty years later in 1910. The works is now in diverse multiple occupation as workshops.

Portland Works has group value with Stag Works, located nearby. The complex is an extremely good and complete example of a large purpose-built integrated cutlery works dating largely from a single 1870s building phase with a well-designed layout. The works was mechanised, with evidence for a steam engine, but also contains unpowered workshop ranges, illustrating Sheffield's reputation built upon the supremacy of traditional methods—it was said in 1879 that "the highest excellence can be attained only by the employment of intelligent hand labour." This type of complex is distinctive to Sheffield's industrial identity as a world centre of excellence in steel manufacturing and processing. Portland Works demonstrates the layout of such a complex, highlights the limited use of power in the cutlery manufacturing process, and retains both hand forges and steam grinding rooms—extremely rare survivals of building types related to specific processes, with probably fewer than five sites in Sheffield now retaining evidence of both.