The Soho Manufactory () was an early

factory A factory, manufacturing plant or production plant is an industrial facility, often a complex consisting of several buildings filled with machinery, where workers manufacture items or operate machines which process each item into another. Th ...

which pioneered

mass production Mass production, also known as mass production, series production, series manufacture, or continuous production, is the production of substantial amounts of standardized products in a constant flow, including and especially on assembly lines ...

on the

assembly line An assembly line, often called ''progressive assembly'', is a manufacturing process where the unfinished product moves in a direct line from workstation to workstation, with parts added in sequence until the final product is completed. By mechan ...

principle, in

Soho SoHo, short for "South of Houston Street, Houston Street", is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan, New York City. Since the 1970s, the neighborhood has been the location of many artists' lofts and art galleries, art installations such as The Wall ...

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands, within the wider West Midlands (region), West Midlands region, in England. It is the Lis ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

, at the beginning of the

Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution, sometimes divided into the First Industrial Revolution and Second Industrial Revolution, was a transitional period of the global economy toward more widespread, efficient and stable manufacturing processes, succee ...

. It operated from 1766–1848 and was demolished in 1853.

Beginnings

In 1756, Edward Ruston leased land on Handsworth Heath from the Lord of the Manor. He deepened Hockley Brook, and built a rolling mill powered by it. In 1761 (or 1764) the "toy" manufacturer Matthew Boulton and his business partner John Fothergill leased the site including a cottage and the mill. The mill was replaced by a new factory, designed and built by the Wyatt family of

Lichfield Lichfield () is a city status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in Staffordshire, England. Lichfield is situated south-east of the county town of Stafford, north-east of Walsall, north-west of ...

, and completed in 1766. The cottage was later demolished and Boulton's home ( Soho House) was built on the site, also by the Wyatts.

Production

The Manufactory produced a wide range of goods from

button A button is a fastener that joins two pieces of fabric together by slipping through a loop or by sliding through a buttonhole. In modern clothing and fashion design, buttons are commonly made of plastic but also may be made of metal, wood, or ...

s, buckles and boxes to japanned ware (collectively called "toys"), and later luxury products such as

silver Silver is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Ag () and atomic number 47. A soft, whitish-gray, lustrous transition metal, it exhibits the highest electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, and reflectivity of any metal. ...

ware and ormolu (a type of gilded

bronze Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals (such as phosphorus) or metalloid ...

Steam engines

In 1782, it became the first site with a

Watt steam engine The Watt steam engine design was an invention of James Watt that became synonymous with steam engines during the Industrial Revolution, and it was many years before significantly new designs began to replace the basic Watt design. The Newcomen ...

with the sun and planet gear. It was also home to the first

steam Steam is water vapor, often mixed with air or an aerosol of liquid water droplets. This may occur due to evaporation or due to boiling, where heat is applied until water reaches the enthalpy of vaporization. Saturated or superheated steam is inv ...

-powered mint, whose presses were subsequently used at the first

Birmingham Mint The Birmingham Mint was a coining mint and metal-working company based in Birmingham, England. Formerly the world's largest privately owned mint, the company produced coins for many foreign nations including France, Italy, China, and much of the ...

Later

In later years, the Manufactory was served by canal at Soho Wharf, at the end of the short Soho Branch of the Birmingham Canal Navigations' Soho Loop. The manufactory was demolished in 1853 and the site subsequently used for housing.

Cultural references

In the 1990s the television

archaeology Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts or ecofacts, ...

programme '' Time Team'' excavated the foundations, in some of the local back gardens. (Series 4, Ep. 3, 1997) The Manufactory is featured on the Bank of England £50 note along with Matthew Boulton,

James Watt James Watt (; 30 January 1736 (19 January 1736 OS) – 25 August 1819) was a Scottish inventor, mechanical engineer, and chemist who improved on Thomas Newcomen's 1712 Newcomen steam engine with his Watt steam engine in 1776, which was f ...

, and the Whitbread Engine.

References

*''A History of Birmingham'', Chris Upton, 1993,

External links

*Early photograph
Search for "Soho Manufactory early photograph"
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Birmingham Images
*Other engravings
Search for "Engraving soho staffordshire"
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Birmingham Images
*Elevated view
Search for "Button and Silver Plate Works"
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Birmingham Images
{{Steam engine configurations, state=collapsed 1761 establishments in England 1853 disestablishments in England Manufacturing plants in England History of Birmingham, West Midlands British companies established in 1761 Manufacturing companies established in 1761 Demolished buildings and structures in the West Midlands (county) Buildings and structures demolished in 1853