IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Chester Street, MANCHESTER, M15 6JE

Student accommodation on Wilmott Street.

Student accommodation in Manchester.

Student accommodation in Manchester.

The First Street South development with the Deansgate Square (Owen Street) development in the background.

Development site on Wilmott Street.

Marsland's is the nearer, and was used for cotton spinning. Built 1795 and rebuilt 1813. Grade II listed. The more monumental Chorlton is roughly contemporary, built for Robert Owen in 1795, and extended in 1803 (out of shot). Owen sold it before moving to New Lanark. Grade II listed. The far chimney belongs to this: Image Part of a good cluster of former mills a little way west of Oxford Road and south of Whitworth Street. Pevsner comments that they "include important examples of early C19 fireproof construction" and several of them produced Macintosh's patented waterproof fabric. Most have been converted to flats.

Built by the Birley family to produce Macintosh's patented waterproof fabric. This is a successor building, dating from 1838. Grade II listed. The tapering chimney, c1851, was built for Chorlton New Mill across the road to which it is connected via an underground flue (Image]). Grade II listed. The main building is now flats. I'm sure a canny developer could carve out a few bijou city-centre apartments from the chimney.

The most well-known of the Chorlton Mills was Charles Macintosh's Mill on the west side of Cambridge Street. The first mill was built in 1814 and had six storeys and two basements with 20 loading bays along Cambridge Street. It was owned by Hugh Birley, infamous for his involvement at the Peterloo Massacre http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peterloo_Massacre . In the 1860s the mill was sold to Charles Macintosh & Company who produced rubberised waterproofs. The word macintosh or ‘mac’ later became a generic term for waterproof overcoats. Soon after World War One the factory was taken over by the Dunlop Company. The original factory on Cambridge Street was demolished but the second and third phases of the factory located along Hulme Street still exist. The octagonal chimney was built in 1851 but actually belonged to the Chorlton Mill across Cambridge Street from the Dunlop factory and connected by an underground flue. During the mid-nineteenth century, this area, then known as “Little Ireland”, was one of Manchester’s worst slums; today, like many of Manchester’s old industrial buildings, these fireproof mill buildings have been converted into apartment blocks (http://manchesterhistory.net/manchester/tours/tour7/area7page9.html Manchester History Net). The building is Grade II –listed (English heritage ID:388200 http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/en-388200-former-cotton-mill-on-east-side-of-junct British Listed Buildings).

Left to right, The Macintosh factory, Chorlton New Mill, Chorlton Old Mill, Marsland's Mill.