Brick House Street, Burslem

Brick House Street, Burslem

Brick House Street runs alongside the Wedgwood Institute and connects Queen Street with Market Street - it is named after the Brick House Potter Works which was built by the Adams family of potters and was, for a time, rented by Josiah Wedgwood.

Brick House Works, Burslem:

The Brick House Works
Josiah Wedgwood's second factory

The Brick House Works was also known as the ‘Bell’ Works from Wedgwood’s practice of summoning his workers by the use of a bell, instead of the traditional horn. Rented from the beginning of 1763 from the Adams’ family, it was at this site that Wedgwood produced the tea and coffee service which earned him, in 1766, permission from Queen Charlotte to style himself ‘Potter to Her Majesty’.

In November 1769 Wedgwood received notice to quit the Brick House premises because his landlord, William Adams, required the buildings for himself. Wedgwood did not fully re-locate from this site to his new Etruria factory until the summer or autumn of 1772

The archway leading from Brick House Street to Market Street

Through the arch is the entrance archway for the old Town Hall and through the arch can be seen the new houses being built on the site of the old Sadler pottery works

"on a little hill in the vast valley, was spread out the Indian-red architecture of Bursley - tall chimneys and rounded ovens, schools, the new scarlet market... and rows of little red houses with the amber chimney chimney-pots, and the gold angel of the blackened Town Hall topping the whole.
The sedate reddish browns and reds of the composition, all netted in flowing scarves of smoke, harmonised exquisitely with the chill blues of the chequered sky.
Beauty was achieved, and none saw it."

"Clayhanger", Arnold Bennett