The mill is on the north bank of the River Sence and backs onto the nearby Grand Union Canal, which generally forms the southern boundary of South Wigston.

Much of the building work (including both hotels and his former home Venetia House) was commissioned by Orson Wright (circa 1880s).

In 1840 the Midland Counties Railway was built between Leicester and Rugby; it ran to the east of where Canal Street stands today.

The town of South Wigston was developed in the late 19th century by the owner of a large brickworks, Orson Wright.

In terms of town planning, Blaby Road was the main cross route and was lined by many of the shops and public buildings.

The Duke Of Clarence Hotel was on Blaby Road; this was very much the centre of South Wigston's social life for the first 50 years of the new township.

St Thomas' parish church was built (minus the tower) in 1893 to supersede a tin tabernacle that continued in service as the Sunday school until it was replaced in the late 1920s.

The brick works ceased production in the early 1930s, though there were still a number of major employers in the area including Toon and Black's footwear factory on Saffron Road and Morrison, manufacturers of electric vehicles, who took over Brunswick Mills between Garden and Irlam Streets in the 1930s.

Further up towards Blaby Road north of the Grand Hotel was Atkinson's hosiery factory which was a major employer in the area for some years after the war as was Dunmores.

In Irlam Street opposite the biscuit factory was Morrison Electricars who used to make electrically powered vehicles such as milk floats.

Other notable businesses who were in South Wigston were Premier Percussion, Constone (concrete pipe makers) at Saffron Lane and Marshall's Coal who were in the yard opposite Blaby Road Park.

The biscuit factory on Canal Street has expanded but many of the old industrial concerns, large and small, are now empty or underused.

St Thomas the Apostle parish church is a red brick Gothic Revival building designed by Stockdale Harrison and Sons.

[4] In the late 1950s, Norbert Elias—then lecturer or reader in sociology at the University of Leicester and his student John Scotson conducted research on the tensions between two working-class neighbourhoods in South Wigston, which they dubbed "Winston Parva."