Metal Box
Barringer, Wallis and Manners - Metal Box Company – Crown Speciality Packaging
If you have a metal sweet tin, a tobacco tin, tea caddy or a cake tin in your house the chances are that it was made by the Metal Box Company Rock Valley, Mansfield and Oddicroft Lane, Sutton in Ashfield. The Rock Valley plant moved in 2010 to Crown Farm Way, Forest Town and still manufactures “speciality tins” such as Biscuits/Tea Caddy/Whisky. The Sutton plant manufactures aerosols only. The Carnaud Metalbox name does not exist anymore, it was taken over by Crown Cork & Seal in 1996 and the two names were kept for a while. Now, the company is only known as CROWN Holdings Inc, the world’s largest metal packaging company and operates 4 divisions: CROWN Speciality Packaging, CROWN Aerosols, CROWN Bevcan and CROWN Foodcan. The manufacture of food and beverage cans also takes place at other plants.
1964 Mansfield Metal Box Childrens Christmas Party
Published: 11:21 Saturday 28 December 2013
Coats Viyella Hosiery factory ,
Sutton in Ashfield 1997 .RIP.
One of the biggest hosiery suppliers in the Uk , CV Hosiery ( aka Simpson Wright and Lowe )
One of the biggest hosiery suppliers in the Uk , CV Hosiery ( aka Simpson Wright and Lowe ) was home to some 800 machines and 400 workers . It closed in 2000 , drowned by cheap imports,customer profits and government indifference .How we wish we still " made in the Uk " now .
In 1997 I left work early to record my daughters xmas concert ,leaving recorder running on my return to a ghost factory shutting for xmas .Now we can invoke the ghost of christmas past once more . Thanks for the happy memories of all who worked there .
If anyone does still want to buy British socks - visit WBrewin.co.uk online :) . Bill Evans 2015 .
Station Road
Station Road
THE UNWINS
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The Unwins settled at Sutton in Ashfield from London c.1760. The eldest son, Samuel, married the heiress Lucy Heathcote. This wealthy couple built Sutton Hall and planted the grounds today known as "The Lawn" or Sutton Lawn. They built the Gothic style factory at Eastfield Side c.1775 based on the revolutionary Richard Arkwright system for the manufacture of high quality nankeen and gingham fabrics. Oxen originally powered the mill, however, the mill was later converted to waterpower after construction of the ‘lawn dam’, which later became a boating lake and part of the recreation grounds. The dam, although close to the Maun was built on the river Idle, a much smaller tributary of the Maun that flowed through Sutton in Ashfield from the Portland Square area. The slow flowing Idle proved to be inadequate so Unwin installed a wind powered pump to replenish the upper reservoir from a lower reservoir after it had turned the 24 foot diameter water-wheel. By 1790 Unwin installed a more reliable steam engine to drive the mill. They also built large mills at Tansley, near Matlock and built Hermitage Mill, the first mill on the Maun to be associated with the textile industry rather than corn grinding. There was no shortage of labour as their London connections provided child labour from the ever growing population of destitute families.
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The original Gothic style Sutton Mill built by Samuel Unwin c.1775 on Eastfield Side.
Samuel Unwin died suddenly at Sutton Hall in 1800 while his son, also Samuel, died at the Sutton Works, unmarried in 1841 leaving the old Hall to become ruinous. Although the family had long left the area, the Unwins demolished the old hall in 1884 and built a new residence on the site for their agent, employed to oversee the family’s considerable property interests in the area. After the death of Samuel Unwin in 1841 the old mill changed hands many times also suffering many serious fires. The site has recently been redeveloped for housing and leisure with the remains of the original mill incorporated into the new development. The 20 acre recreational grounds including the dam & millpond are now owned & maintained by Asfield District Council providing the venue for the annual Ashfield Show.
BARRINGER, WALLIS & MANNERS, Limited,
Greggs and Costa Coffee to move into new Notts business park
The 120-acre site is already home to Bombardier, Parker Knoll and Midland Aerospace
Nottinghamshire Coalfields
Sutton Colliery
Also Called Brierley Hill Colliery
Plus Earlier Workings
1873-1989
Pretty Polly
The other main industry in Sutton-in-Ashfield was textiles and in particular hosiery. Pretty Polly wasn’t the name of a favourite pet bird, but a hosiery firm which manufactured products in Sutton from the 1920s until 2005. Though the company was originally named after a winning race horse of that name, the Pretty Polly logo was depicted with a parrot right up until the 1960s!
The name was a good bet for many years. The brand was the second best-selling in the stockings and tights market in the UK by 1957, when it was added to the empire of Thomas Tilling. He also owned the Ballerina Hosiery brand as part of the Walton Hosiery Company. A few years later these companies merged as Pretty Polly Holdings Ltd.
The team at Pretty Polly were great innovators. They introduced a number of things we take for granted today, such as seam-free stockings and tights and ‘hold-ups’, stockings which don’t need the help of suspender belts to stay up. Their ‘holds-ups’ were even shown on the TV program Tomorrow’s World.
The company was bought out by Courtaulds and the factory closed and moved some 14 miles to Belper in 2005. Pretty Polly has been advertised by some well known models, including Eva Herzigova (better known for her Wonder bra ads, also made by Courtaulds), Sara Cox and Rachel Stevens (bras).
Advertising
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Pretty Polly was the first hosiery company to advertise on TV in 1980. In 1994 Laura Bailey modelled for the company, then in 1998, Eva Herzigová became the face (and legs) of Pretty Polly advertising. Sara Cox also modelled their hosiery. In 1999 the company launched their first bras, known as bbras. In 2003, British singer Rachel Stevens became the face of PP advertising. In September 2014 it was announced that Sophie Ellis-Bextor would be the Face and Legs of Pretty Polly
