Welcome

This website is now an archive of the restoration and should only be used as a resource. Please visit the Lion Salt Works website for the most up-to-date information.



Welcome to the Lion Salt Works blog

The Lion Salt Works is a historic brine salt making site that is being restored and transformed into a unique heritage attraction. Led by Cheshire West and Chester Council, this £8million project will see the site reborn as a fascinating destination for tourists, day visitors and families and a valued resource for local communities, businesses and heritage interest groups.

Located in the village of Marston, close to the town of Northwich, the site lies adjacent to the Trent and Mersey Canal and is close to the historic Anderton Boat Lift. A substantial part of the site is a Scheduled Monument.

Restoration work has now started on the site, with an expected opening in spring 2015. The Lion Salt Works is currently closed to the public.

Friday 13 December 2013

Lion Salt Works Restoration - December 2013

 Towards the end of the year the first of the buildings are beginning to be completed.
  
The Historic Core

The Historic core of the works involves Pan Houses and Stove Houses 3 and 4, the Loading Bay and Stove House 2.

Pan House 3 structural repairs are complete and the roof has been replaced. This means the dense scaffold can be removed and the pan is visible once more for the first time since March 2012.



The final touches are put to Pan House 3 as the edges of the pan are rebuilt. John admires his handywork! 


The newly built Pan House 4 eastern wall is revealed clad in larch timber.


In Stove House 3 the roof panels have been stripped and repaired. The new roof panels put in place and the existing undulating ridge-line retained.



The scaffold has been removed and the first floor warehouse revealed for the first time in over two years. This has allowed repairs to begin on the warehouse floor. 



Repairs to the trusses allowed the lean of the roof timbers to remain in place - a testament to the sums of the structural engineer.


The final roof panels have been put on Stove House 4 meaning all the buildings in the south of the historic core are now water-tight. 



The scaffold has been removed down the eastern elevation and the perfectly repaired wiggly-wonky wall of revealed again.


The chimney in the Packing Area has been carefully repaired and a new metal cap put on top.




Repairs have begun in earnest on Stove House 2. This has seen the roof fully stripped of sheets. 

The steel-work has been built to support the stove house floor. The timber-work repairs are complete and the final repairs have begun on the roof panels. 





Peripheral Buildings

Repairs are almost complete on the Manager’s House with re-pointing of the brickwork, timber repairs and rebuilding of the chimney. The roof slates will be removed and re-felted.  




External repairs have begun on the Red Lion Inn. The brickwork has been re-pointed and new chimney stacks re-built.




Stove House 5

Stove House 5 is being transformed from an empty shell into a working, functioning building. As the scaffold has been removed the distinct form of the building is visible for the first time since it was dismantled four years ago in 2009. The weather-board cladding of the upper surfaces contrasts with the re-used original brickwork that forms the side of the Stove House.




The first-floor, conference facilities are visible as an open space for the first time with the open window views across the land to the east.



The ground floor is beginning to take shape as the electrical and mechanical services are put in.

   
Jordan Gregory (Wates Construction Site Manager) supervised the work on site.