Historical building and construction museums?

[teaboyjim]

Has anybody got any suggestions of historical building techniques museums?

 

[SFK]

I was just now considering visiting the brick-and-tile-museum in Bridgwater, Somerset
https://swheritage.org.uk/our-sites/brick-and-tile-museum/

Why do you ask?

 

[teaboyjim]

Looks nice. Here's a pub quiz question: How old is concrete?

 

[EddieM]

First concrete was used in Roman times.

 

[teaboyjim]

First concrete was used in Roman times.

I was surprised when I learned that as I always thought it was fairly modern

 

[teaboyjim]

I'm planning on visiting this: https://thebrickworksmuseum.org/

 

[gasbanni]

Has anybody got any suggestions of historical building techniques museums?

Spab is an eexcellent resource !!

https://www.spab.org.uk/home

Books leaflets courses it all there .......enjoy !!

 

[bourbon]

I'm a re-enactor. specializing in crafts of the medieval period. One of our mates is Tony Muggridge. He was the last itinerant brickmaker in the country, when he retired, he donated a lot of his moulds to that Southampton place. To tell you how good he is, he can date a brick to a date AND season that it was made. In certain circumstances, he will even tell you who made the bricks! A.J. Mugridge | Traditional Handmade Bricks, Tiles, Edgers, Pavers, Special Brickwork, Shropshire.

 

[ericmark]

Where I was dragged up in Shotton Flintshire we were close to Buckley know world over for their mugs and brickwork, seems we had right type of clay, so were clay pits everywhere, and it seems at the top of Shotton lane was a group of around 10 houses and the builder bought just enough bricks to make a kiln and all the house bricks were made on site from the clay on site.

Ruabon however was the main place for bricks, just outside Wrexham, but in Elm Quarry off the A494 near Ewloe when I was a lad we watched them tending the kins, where they made fire bricks for JS&S steel works in Shotton and used Sentinel steam wagons to take them to the steel works, which gives you the link to Shropshire, you can still see the name on the Sentinel works in Shrewsbury going out to Battle Fields direction.

 

[teaboyjim]

Are there any historical sites or museums near that area that you know of or could recommend?

 

[ericmark]

The Grosvenor near the man on horse with hat in hand in Chester is only local one, old police station in Wrexham but Buckley mugs very little, there was a guy in Mold who did guided tours did one with Mold Camera Club, likely the Mold Camera Club is your best bet for local history was every Monday but now all on line, and since now moved away lost touch.

 

[teaboyjim]

I love the idea of brick making in the old traditional way - and building houses from clay - I've seen this documentary about a castle being built in France and they had to use all of the traditional methods with which to construct it with.

 

[teaboyjim]

If anybody else is interested in ancient building techniques here is the French castle that's being built using original techniques from the period (That this type of castle would have been built)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guédelon_Castle#:~:text=Guédelon Castle (Château de Guédelon,technique, dress, and material.
https://www.building.co.uk/buildings/projects-guedelon-castle-france/5099273.article
I think you could probably find the documentary on youtube or online if you searched

 

[ericmark]

Never realised how lucky I am to have seen the kilns in use.

 

[teaboyjim]

Do you know if we've got a fairly large brick making industry here in the UK?