The Soho Manufactory

Description:The Soho Manufactory was founded in 1761 by Matthew Boulton on Handsworth Heath in the parish of Handsworth near Birmingham. The site of a water mill was taken over, quickly converted and expanded over the next five or six years into an extensive button, buckle, toy and plated-ware manufactory. This was to be the largest factory in the Birmingham area for many decades. The manufactory continued to grow over a period of four decades reaching its maximum size in about 1805. All the firms in the Manufactory were owned exclusively by Matthew Boulton except for Boulton and Fothergill, the engine manufactory of Boulton and Watt and James Watt's letter-copying machine company. The manufactory was demolished in 1863 by Matthew Boulton's grandson, Matthew Piers Watt Boulton. The engine works had been demolished earlier in the late 1850s by a firm then known as James Watt and Co (see Soho Foundry page).