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Edinburgh, Granton, Granton Park Avenue, United Wire Works
Car Factory (Modern), Wire Works
Site Name Edinburgh, Granton, Granton Park Avenue, United Wire Works
Classification Car Factory (Modern), Wire Works
Alternative Name(s) Former Madelvic Car Factory; Granton Wire Works
Canmore ID 183740
Site Number NT27NW 350
NGR NT 230 770
NGR Description Centred NT 230 770
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/183740
- Council Edinburgh, City Of
- Parish Edinburgh (Edinburgh, City Of)
- Former Region Lothian
- Former District City Of Edinburgh
- Former County Midlothian
NT27NW 350 centred 233 770
Originating in Glasgow in 1825 with the establishment of a wire-making business by William McMurray, the United Works was formed in 1897 through the merger of Robert McFarlane & Son (Edina Works, Leith), MacCormack & Mills (Baltic Works, Bridgeton, Glasgow), James Brodie & Co (Great Eastern Works, Glasgow), and William Mountain & Sons (Trafalgar Wire Works, Newcastle-upon-Tyne). The company concentrated its production at the former Madelvic Car Factory in Granton in 1925, and added its own wire mill in 1941.
The complex manufactured wire cloth for a variety of industrial uses, but its primary market was the Scottish paper industry. As this declined in the late 20th century, other products such as filters and battery components grew in importance, and in 2001, the broadloom division was closed, wire cloth manufacture being reduced to small-loom production. The brass foundry and wire mill were subsequently sold to a separate company.
The works included at its east end the former Madelvic Car Factory (which produced cars from 1898 to 1900), this area being devoted to broadloom production, and the Paper Products Department. At the west end of the site were the South Mill (foundry and annealing departments) and the North Mill (wire drawing mill, built in 1941). Most of these and the other buildings in the complex are single-storeyed steel-framed brick constructions. At the time of survey in 2001, weaving had been concentrated in the Small-Loom Weaving Department in a blue-brick building at the south-east corner of the complex, which dated from 1964.
Information from the company and 'The History of the United Wire Works', (1947), Pillans & Wilson, Edinburgh
Information from RCAHMS.
(MKO 2003)
Standing Building Recording (November 2004 - December 2004)
NT27NW 349 NT 2317 7707
Standing building recording
NT 2317 7707 A desk-based assessment and historic building survey were undertaken in November and December 2004 at the former Madelvic car factory in advance of redevelopment. Map references suggest that an 18th-century house and gardens, Broom Park, was replaced in 1898 by the construction of the Madelvic works, office and generating blocks - symmetrical rectangular blocks of well-lit flat-roofed brick buildings. This was the first purpose-built car factory in Britain. It is likely that the central area of the works block was enclosed some time between 1902 and 1906. The buildings were used as a car factory until WW1, and after 1925 became a central component of the United Wire Works until 2001. Changing use throughout the 20th century saw the majority of the internal features associated with car production removed, though small vestiges survived, and the external character of the buildings were largely intact.
Archive to be deposited in NMRS.
Sponsor: Malcolm Fraser Architects.
G Geddes 2005
