Weavers' cottage

Cellar loomshops on the ground floor or in the basement were found where cotton was woven, as they provided high humidity.

Medieval period peasants' cottages have rarely survived, while the prestigious dwellings of merchants and traders are still in evidence.

The loom shop was marked by the long multi-light mullioned window that became common in urban settings.

They were adapted or built specially at a time when spinning technology was sufficiently advanced to supply the needs of the weavers.

[2] Terraces of three-storey brick-built domestic workshops were built in Macclesfield after silk weaving was introduced around 1790 and more than 600 weavers had looms in their homes in 1825.

In the house below was a kitchen and scullery and living room on the ground floor and two bedrooms on the first, a typical two-up-two-down cottage.

In the 1790s, the demand for calico expanded and more towns switched to cotton weaving producing cloth for the emerging printing industry.

In East Anglia detached cottages were built from timber and cob, while woolen weaving communities favoured three-storey two-up two-down with a loom shop above.

[16] The loomshop design was adequate until power was needed and in a sense the early weaving sheds were extended loom shops.

In 1884, Vincent van Gogh made a series of drawings and paintings of rural artisan weavers and the loomshops in their cottages.

[17] "A weaver who has to direct and to interweave a great many little threads has no time to philosophize about it, but rather he is so absorbed in his work that he doesn't think but acts, and he feels how things must go more than he can explain it."

[18] By then rural weaving was not a prosperous trade; income varied dramatically depending upon crop yields for material and market conditions.

Weavers were living a poor life, especially in comparison to urban centers of textile manufacturing nearby such as Leiden.