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New Lanark, Scotland

This image is by R.Pollack and is copyright free

 

New Lanark in southern Scotland was founded in the eighteenth century by David Dale. It was one of a number of villages built around water powered cotton mills at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. Britain at this time was moving from a primarily rural population to a primarily urban one. During this period of industrialisation villages would be viewed with nostalgia, as a place where everybody knew your name. In the nineteenth century thousands of people would visit the picturesque village of Clovelly in north Devon, for example, trying to rediscover seemingly more innocent times for a few hours. In many ways a nostalgic view of villages is misleading, but this did not stop people trying to find the largely imagined qualities of the past. The village of New Lanark became famous between 1800 and 1825 when mill manager Robert Owen instituted changes that stood in stark contrast to trends in much of the rest of the country. Child labour and corporal punishment were abolished. Villagers were provided with good housing, educational opportunities, free healthcare and affordable food. People naturally associated this liberal regime with the fact that New Lanark was a village. In reality it probably had more to do with the remarkable personality of Robert Owen. Rather than simply being an illustration of a better way of living, New Lanark is a reminder of nineteenth century preoccupations. People at this time were living through one of the most significant periods of change in human history. They reacted against science and technology by inventing the innocence of childhood, and the imagined worlds of new literary genre known as children's literature; they read Tennyson's romantic tales of King Arthur; they were interested in mesmerism. And they were nostalgic about village life, associating it with better, more innocent times. David Dale's New Lanark was a way of living the new life in what seemed like the old way.

Today New Lanark has been restored and is one of Scotland's biggest tourist attractions, with about 400,000 people visiting each year. There is a visitors' centre where the history of the village is imaginatively portrayed. Old mill buildings house coffee and gift shops, and an outlet of the Edinburgh Woolen Mill.

 

 

Opening Times: The visitor centre is open daily October - March, 11am - 5pm and April to September 10am - 5pm.

It is closed 25th December and 1st January.

Address: New Lanark World Heritage Site, South Lanarkshire, Scotland ML11 9DB

Directions: New Lanark is near Lanark, just off the A73. The village is about an hour's drive from Edinburgh or Glasgow, and is well signposted from the M74 and the M8. Click here for an interactive map centred on New Lanark.

Access: Most of the visitors' centre is accessible to wheelchair users. A free leaflet detailing arrangements for people with mobility problems is available from the visitors' centre.

Contact:

telephone: 01555 661345

fax: 01555 665738

e-mail: trust@newlanark.org

web site: www.newlanark.org