It’s two years this month since we spun our first cotton yarn and some major projects are taking shape in the run up to the anniversary.
With our reception area nearly complete, a range of t-shirts close to production and more changes around Tower Mill, we’re gearing up for a summer of developments.
The perfect showcase
Our bespoke furniture is in place in our reception area, ready to be filled with products made from our yarns.
Crafted by Macclesfield based furniture maker Nathan Millar, the cabinets and units are made from oak and dyed in English Fine Cottons’ shade of blue.
The showroom has been designed to reflect our historic mill that houses state-of-the-art machinery – a traditional haberdashery style with a modern twist.
In the coming weeks, we’ll be selecting products that have a true British provenance to put on display. And, among them will be rolls and bolts of our luxury shirtings.
We’ll include some items made by our customers and in the coming months add our own ranges of clothing, fabrics and homeware linens.
British-made T-shirts
A collection of T-shirts for a customer is on the verge of production. After many months of honing fabrics to create six high-quality, classic tops, they are now in the final design stages.
The range includes a classic formal t-shirt, a casual t-shirt, polo shirts and a sweatshirt and have been made from start to finish by UK manufacturers.
Tower Mill continues to evolve
Our long-term restoration works to our Grade II listed mill continues, but as our operations grow, we’ve also created specialised production areas for our different projects.
We’ve recently renovated part of the first floor – next to our new fabric inspection room – to create a space for more fabric storage and for winding coloured yarns.
We’ve installed an additional winding machine, solely for winding dyed yarns on to cardboard cones for our customers.
Our yarns are dyed by Blackburn Yarn Dyers, but the plastic dye-cones are incompatible with many weavers and knitters. They come back to us to be re-wound.
The machine is kept away from our main production areas to avoid colour contamination with our virgin yarns.
These are just some of the many developments taking place as we head towards our second anniversary later this month.
When we went into production in 2016, we embarked on a long-term mission to revive the UK’s cotton industry. And as you can see from the video clip below of our six fully loaded spinning frames in action, cotton spinning has is pretty well re-established.