Architecture Notes

Event ID 774053

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Architecture Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/774053

(Location cited as NS 888 927). Kilncraigs Mills, mid 19th century and later. An extensive group of multi-storey mill buildings, the oldest of which dates back to the 1860's. This is a five-storey and attic, 3-by-13-bay rubble building with a Palladian front.

The Burnside Mill (c. 1880-90) is a five-storey, 13-bay block with a belfry at one end and an eight-storey water tower in the angle between it and a four-storey and attic, 4-by-13-bay block.

The contemporary West Mill is also five storeys high, 8 bays long, with a later three-storey, 11-bay block, extended by three storeys in brick. A continuation of this range is the bow-fronted, five-storey Waste House, also with three rubble storeys.

The main offices are in a five-storey, 3-by-13-bay Renaissance block.

Originally the mills were powered by steam engines and one single-storey engine house survives. Power is now supplied by a generating station with three Belliss and Morcom steam turbines in a 2-by-4-bay brick house with round-headed windows. There is a wooden cooling tower of a now rare pattern.

Most of the machinery is modern, and there are modern single-storey spinning sheds.

J R Hume 1976.

NS 888 927 Prior to the redevelopment of the site of Patons & Baldwins Mill (NMRS NS89SE 51), a programme of standing building recording and historical research was carried out from December 2000 to April 2001.

Patons & Baldwins Mill is located to the S of the centre of Alloa, close to Alloa Tower. The site covers an area of approximately 4ha (10 acres) of land and consists of a number of multi-storey and single-storey sheds and offices dating from the mid- to late 19th century to the 1980s. There was also much evidence for the foundations and remains of previous buildings, which have since been demolished.

The standing building recording and survey, together with research of the archive of the mill, revealed the chronological and structural development of the site from its origins in the early 19th century to the closure of the factory at the end of the 20th century.

The site archive will be lodged with the NMRS.

Sponsor: Tesco Stores plc.

R Toolis and D Sproat 2001

Paton's Kilncraigs Mills date from the early 19th century. The complex grew and evolved throughout the 19th and 20th centuries until its closure in 1999 . The company merged with one of its main competitors in 1920 to become Paton and Baldwins, and in the late 20th century was absorbed into the portfolio of Coats Viyella.

Although much of the large site is occupied by single-storeyed sheds and ancillary buildings, it is dominated by the multi-storeyed North Mill, West Mill and Burnside Mill, as well as a tall brick-built water tower, and the offices (1904) and Wareroon (1936) at the S end of the site. At the time of survey in 2001, there were plans to demolish most of the mill to accommodate a new Tescos supermarket, retaining the office and wareroom blocks for conversion to alternative use, possibly by Clackmannan College.

AOC Archaeology were employed to create a detailed record of the site prior to demolition and redevelopment.

The Museum and Heritage Services of Clackmannashire Council have acquired a full archive from Paton & Baldwin

Architect of office block: William Kerr, 1904