Salt beard

When I wrote a post about the Salt Beer Factory last month, John commented that 'salt' and 'beer' don't seem to go well together. I wonder what he thinks about 'Salt' and 'beard'?  Every depiction I've seen (statues, busts, paintings) of Sir Titus Salt, Saltaire's Victorian founder, show him with a magnificent, luxurious beard. The gallery in Salts Mill that houses some information about the mill's history holds this interesting portrait. From a distance, it's a not unfamiliar portrayal of the man. Take a closer look though and you will find that it is made of textiles, ripped and teased to suggest the portrait. Rather clever, I thought, since he presided over one of the largest textile manufacturing enterprises in the area.



























When I first started writing this blog, so many years ago now, I included a lot more information about Saltaire and the amazing story of its creation and creator. I don't want to repeat old stuff but for more recent readers, suffice to say that Sir Titus Salt was an entrepreneur and philanthropist who ran a large textile business in the city of Bradford in the early 1800s. Concerned about living conditions in the crowded and insanitary city, he consolidated all his businesses by building a huge textile mill, Salts Mill, on a greenfield site with canal and rail links, outside the city. It opened in 1853. He then proceeded over the next twenty years to build a model village around the mill, with homes and superb facilities (dining hall, schools, church, recreation) for his workforce, far superior to anything else that existed locally. He called it Saltaire, combining his own name with that of the river Aire that runs beside the mill.

The mill ceased textile production in 1986, after which it was bough by another visionary entrepreneur and philanthropist, the late Jonathan Silver. He turned it into a thriving hub: a mix of manufacturing, business, retail outlets, art gallery space and restaurants. The village around continues as a modern community with a thriving creative ethos. Click the 'About Saltaire' tab at the top of my blog for more info.