Darley Abbey Mills (North Complex) Preparation Building And Cottage And Workshop And Cart Sheds To North Of Site

Darley Abbey Mills (North Complex): Preparation Building, Cottage, Workshop and Cart Sheds

A range of buildings forming the northernmost part of an extensive, multi-phase cotton textile factory, dating to around 1790 with alterations made in the late 19th and late 20th centuries. The complex was built by the Evans family of Darley Abbey. The buildings are constructed in red brick with slate roof coverings.

The complex forms an L-shaped range defining the extreme north end of the site, comprising a Preparation Building, Cottage and Workshop in a continuous range, with Cart Sheds forming the return to the south.

The Preparation Building is a seven-bay, two-storey range aligned north-west to south-east, dating to around 1790, with remains of a three-bay return to the south-west latterly converted to open cart sheds. The north-facing elevation, which originally formed the northern boundary of the site, has small windows that are possibly later insertions. The southern elevation features a number of large arched openings on the ground floor and a brick-built external stair to the upper level. The upper floor has an irregular fenestration pattern, with most openings fitted with multi-pane frames.

The interior of the Preparation Building is of exceptional architectural significance. Two timber-floored sections exist to the west of the range, while the remaining part of the first floor is fitted with brick jack-arches springing from massive timber beams with timber skew backs and tied by wrought iron rods. These beams are covered in plaster to provide fire protection and are supported by tall, rounded cruciform section cast iron columns with crudely cast capitals. The roof is carried on timber queen-post trusses with cambered collar beams.

The Cottage and Workshop occupy the seven-bay north-western section of the range under the same roofline and probably also date from the 1790s. The westernmost three bays are occupied by a dwelling and the remainder by a workshop. The exterior features a variety of windows, some with sash frames and others with cast-iron frames below shallow brick arched lintels.

The Cart Shed's three-bay eastern wall forms the return of the northern range shown on the 1811 map, though the present arrangement of open cart shed is a later modification.

Historically, the northern building at Darley Abbey is shown with its return range to the south on the 1811 map and likely dates to the 1790s. The internal structure of the first floor is of great significance. This arrangement of fire-retarding construction was the earliest developed by William Strutt in his mills at Derby (1792–3), West Mill (1793–5) at Belper, and The Warehouse at Milford (early 1790s). It formed the starting point from which fire-proofing construction without the use of wooden components at Ditherington Flax Mill, Shrewsbury (1797), developed. The Strutt buildings no longer survive and the building at Darley Abbey is now the only known example of this pioneer arrangement. The cast iron columns have a sectional form similar to those known to have been used in the 1790s Strutt buildings at Derby, Milford and Belper and still surviving at North Mill at Belper, a rebuild of 1804.

This complex forms part of the textile manufacturing site at Darley Abbey which traded under the name of Boars Head Mills. The complex as an entity is exceptional in its completeness of survival and displays important aspects of the development of fire-proofing technology for textile factories. The site forms part of a closely related network of pioneer textile manufacturing sites in the Derwent Valley. Thomas Evans was an associate of Richard Arkwright of Cromford, and the Evans family was related by marriage to the Strutt family who had mills in Belper, Milford and Derby. Darley Abbey sits alongside these settlements in terms of both historic and architectural significance. The mill complex retains all of its major early buildings as well as 19th-century additions, many of which are distinguished by the use of iron roofs.