Old Town Mill

Old Town Mill is a former textile mill of mid-19th century date with later additions, located around a narrow cobbled courtyard on the south-west side of Old Town Mill Lane.

The mill is constructed of coursed squared gritstone with ashlar dressings and roofed with slate and some corrugated metal.

The principal building is a large two-storey mill range of 1851, running south-east to north-west parallel with Old Town Mill Lane. It measures ten bays long by seven wide, with a two-storey structure plus attic floor. The windows are tall with six panes and ashlar dressings, with a sill band at first floor level and a modillion eaves cornice with kneelers and gable copings. The roof has skylights on its north-east side. At the north end of the north-east elevation is an altered ground floor vehicle entrance with a round arch window above, lighting an integral engine shed. The south-east gable end has a central line of taking-in doors, with three windows to each side on the first floor and two smaller windows to each side on the attic floor. The ground floor has three windows to the right and one to the left beyond an altered, partly blocked entrance. The north-west end is continuous with the boiler house, with five attic floor windows visible above. The south-west elevation adjoins ruinous north-lights sheds. A pair of wrought iron gates links the mill range to the southern range, with 'Mitchell Brothers' across the top band and 'Old Town' across the middle, attached to stone gate piers.

The boiler house adjoins the mill to the south-west, a single bay wide structure with a hipped roof. The ground floor has a vehicle entrance to the north-east with a single window above. To the north-west side is a first floor entrance accessed from an external stone stair with iron handrail and two further windows. To the rear is a cylindrical stone chimney stack with a moulded crown and a date stone of 1890.

A multi-storey warehouse, aligned south-west to north-east, forms the end of the courtyard. It has four storeys plus attics and is ten bays long. Many windows are partly blocked; all are tall and originally had six panes. The south-west gable end has a central line of taking-in doors, converted to windows, with partly and wholly blocked windows to either side. The taking-in doors have iron balconies on the upper three storeys. The north-east gable end also has taking-in doors offset from the centre, with a hoist above and a line of windows to the left. A date stone on the wall reads 1889.

A stair tower adjoins the warehouse to the south-east, with a pyramidal roof rising above the other buildings and a date stone over the door reading 'Old Town Mill: M.Bros: A.D. 1881'. The entrance on the south-east side has a double timber door with overlight and ashlar surround. Four round-arched windows with ashlar surrounds are staggered following the line of the stair to the third floor, where three smaller round-arched windows lie in a line.

A south-west range comprises two sections, both two storey but with the south-western part higher than the south-eastern. The taller, south-western building has three tall ground floor windows on its south-east elevation and three smaller ones above. The north-west elevation is partly rendered and has a wide vehicle entrance with sliding doors. On the first floor is a continuous run of windows set back from the main façade, with a single window in each gable end and an end stack to the north-east gable. The south-eastern building has a hipped roof to the south-east and a central entrance with a window above in the south-east elevation. The south-west elevation has two windows to each floor, one of the lower ones blocked, and a doorway with one window on the ground floor and two windows above on the first floor on the north-west elevation. The lower floor of this building is constructed of massive stone blocks, possibly indicating an earlier build. Between the mill building and the warehouse lies a small series of ruinous north-lights sheds, with only remnants of roofing remaining.

Internally, the 1851 mill range ground floor has a double row of cast iron columns with bolting heads for line shafting, joined at the top by a cast iron beam. The first floor has similar columns with a surviving pulley and section of drive shaft. The engine house at the north-west end is separated from the mill by a stone wall, with the entry of the drive shaft visible in the internal wall. A blocked archway adjoins the boiler house to the north-west. The boiler house has two storeys, with the upper floor possibly a former workshop or drying house. The warehouse interior shows no evidence of a power source but a steel-framed winding mechanism for a hoist survives on the top floor. The roof structure has heavy cross beams but appears otherwise of light construction. The stair tower gives access to both the two-storey mill and the warehouse, with heavily worn stone stairs running around a central lift with metal grille doors. The taller south-west building, in use as a workshop, is open to the first floor.