Workshop Dwellings

Manchester, Houses with, attic workshops

In late 18th and early 19th century Manchester typical city-centre housing included buildings designed to incorporate cellars and atticGlossary Term workshops. Similar buildings are found elsewhare, for example in Macclesfield, Cheshire, where the workshops were used for weaving silk. They can be seen as an urban parallel to 18th century Pennine stone cottages with rows of upper weavers' windows. Information on exactly how they were used and occupied before the 1801 census is sparse, but they were probably erected by specualtors for skilled workers or artisans on good incomes.

Documentary research, and the evidence of surviving buildings, has shown they were often erected in ones and twos, with more being added as the developer could afford it. Where they survive they are usually greatly altered.