Specifiers Journal 2016

Lion Salt Works, Northwich, Cheshire
Donald Insall Associates
The Lion Salt Works is the last
remnant of an industry stretching
back two millennia and is a Scheduled
Monument. The pan houses and stove
houses were greatly decayed through
exposure to salt and subsidence and
many were in an advanced state
of collapse. A feasibility study was
carried out and a Conservation Plan
was prepared and developed with
innovative proposals for the reuse of
the site, which were awarded £5M
HLF funding. The restoration began
on the delicate industrial buildings
and site regeneration allowing its
transformation into a visitor attraction
and salt museum. A new visitor centre
was also provided as part of the
project.
Salt-making in Cheshire dates back
over 2000 years, when the salt towns of
Cheshire were first established by the
Romans. Originally salt was extracted
from the ground by a series of natural
brine pits. In the 17th century the first
of a series of mines were begun in the
Northwich region but were exhausted
around 1850. The exhaustion of the
mined rock salt supplies resulted in
a change to wild brine pumping. The
brine was pumped out of the ground
to supply the salt works based at
the surface. By the late-19th century
brine shafts and traditional open pan
salt works dominated the area around
Northwich, many controlled by the
monopolistic Salt Union.
In 1856 John Thompson Senior (1790-
1867) and John Thompson Junior
(1821-1899) constructed the Alliance
Salt Works on the eastern side of the
Lion Salt Works site. The Thompson
family sold the Alliance Salt Works to
the Salt Union and it closed around
1900.
In 1894, Henry Ingram Thompson,
constructed a new salt works that
became known as the ‘Lion Salt
Works’. The new company quickly
built a series of pan and stove houses.
The salt works ran on the site for
almost 100 years until the eventual
closure of the works in June 1986.
70 SPECIFIERS JOURNAL