Stanley Mills

Stanley Mills are described as "one the best-preserved relics of the 18th-century Industrial Revolution".

By 1785, a group of Perth merchants were eager to establish a cotton industry on the River Tay, where huge amounts of water-power were available. They persuaded the English textile baron Richard Arkwright to invest his money and expertise.

The mills were built in 1786. Machinery was powered initially by water wheels, and later by electricity generated by water-powered turbines. As the market changed and new technologies developed, buildings were added, adapted, expanded, shut down, reopened and demolished.

By the late 1960s, Stanley was mainly producing artificial fibres. In 1979, a management buyout led to the formation of Stanley Mills (Scotland), but the market proved too competitive and the mills eventually closed in 1989.

They are now a Historic Scotland property partly open to the public, and partly converted to residential flats. Interesting place.
You wouldn't want to have worked there. In the carding rooms, for instance, you would be at constant risk of fire from the cotton dust in the air, you would end up hard of hearing from the noise, and with chronic lung conditions from the dust; and you had a pretty good chance of getting injured by the machines... those things are scary. Oh... and you would quite likely have been around 9 years old when you started working there!

Today, the buildings are rather lovely, light, quiet, airy; inside and out. I edited the photo to add some edge - it seemed fitting.