Abstract
From the mid-19th Century there appeared successive attempts at Utopian experiments of “Industrial Villages” by reformist factory-owners in northern and middle part of England. Take notable examples-Copley and Akroydon near Halifax, Saltaire near Bradford, Port Sunlight near Liverpool, Bournville near Birmingham and New Earswick near York. They were all run by successful non-conformist industriarists and two of them by Quakers (Bournville and New Earswick).
They were sometimes also called as “Company Towns” and some of them deserved the name. Yet, generally speaking, they did not for some reasons.
Above all, those industrialists did not adopt the tied housing policy like that of Japanese “Syataku.” In other words, some part of industrial villages were supplied to the local people nothing to do with the firm.
Chief reason for this policy can be found, I think, in their mental attitudes, or rather mental climate around them towards business. There is a natural tendency for bourgeois class in any country to change their target in life from business to status. But here in Britain, this tendency was strengthened by the fact that Britain was taking a strong lead in economic and industrial development and consequentry, once getting wealthy, they were unable to have a proper target in their way of life. So many of them were seeking value in getting higher status and behaving like big landowners, rather than like factory-owners. This was partly reflected in the styles adopted in building houses in industrial villages-Tudor Gothic, maybe a symbol of the past great age and also of the strong aristocracy, and also in accepting local people other than their employees to their villages.
Some other industriarists were eager to improve the position of their people in accordance with their religeous creed. But we should not miss the side trend of industrial scenes which, paradoxically enough for the age of progress, was imbued with medievalism.
