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Area guide
Foundry Quarter
A former industrial district of brick warehouses and steel windows, now converted lofts and dark-brick infill houses.
Transit
8 min to Central by rail
Schools
One primary, one secondary
Cafés
Six, and a roastery
Foundry Quarter made iron until 1968 and then made nothing at all for thirty years. The mills stayed standing because nobody could afford to demolish them, and that accidental preservation is now the reason people want to live here.
What was built here
Two kinds of building, and it is worth knowing which one you are standing in. The first is the original industrial fabric: red brick in lime mortar, cast-iron columns, riveted steel roof trusses, tall Crittall glazing set to a north light. Converted from 2004 onward, these give you volume — five and six metre ceilings — and very little conventional room structure.
The second is infill. Since 2015 the gaps between the mills have filled with dark brick houses on tight plots, usually courtyard-planned because the sites are landlocked. They are quieter buildings, and they borrow the palette rather than imitate the scale.
Living here
Conversions here are warmer than their reputation. Most were insulated internally at the point of conversion, and a well-executed one holds heat better than a Victorian terrace. A poorly executed one does not. The single most useful document to ask for is the conversion's building-control completion certificate.
The Quarter still works during the day — three of the yards remain in trade occupation — and it is not a silent place before six in the evening. Buyers who want a village should look at Linden Park.