Listed Building record MDR10828 - Clock Warehouse, Hoskins Wharf, Shardlow

This is a four-storey brick building erected 1780-81 and altered in 1812. It underwent conversion to a museum and tearoom in 1970, is now a restaurant, and further alterations are planned (in 1995) by the new owners, Mansfield Breweries. Photographs show it bearing the legend "F E STEVENS Ltd - TRENT CORN MILLS - No. 2 MILL" painted on the brickwork of the east wall of the central block, but there is no evidence within the building to support its use as a mill, and it seems most likely that it was erected as a warehouse in 1780 on the completion of the Trent and Mersey Canal, which ends a mile and a half from here, and was used for the storage and transhipment of grain at the terminal basin, between the canal head and the A6 road. The wheel and rope seen in the central attic belong to the original hoist that loaded sacks into and out of the canal barges and the different storeys of the warehouse. The north end hoist was added later to load into and out of carts, and there were also hoists on the east side of each wing and at the south end, for which no mechanism now remains. (1) A grade II listed former corn warehouse, converted c. 1970 to a museum and tea rooms, now a public house [2016]. It was constructed in 1780, from red brick with brick and stone dressings, and has a red plain tile roof with central louvred vent, projecting hoist roof to north, and stepped eaves band. It is of four storeys and five bays with a wide, slightly advanced, gabled central bay. The interior has the original floors and timbers. This warehouse is one of the earliest in a series of canal warehouses, built after the completion of the Trent and Mersey Canal when Shardlow was a thriving inland port. The building had its own spur from the canal to enable narrow boats to get right into the building to unload, via the central arch. See list description for more details. (2)