Aerial view of Henry Venables Ltd., Stafford

Move your pointing device over the image to zoom to detail. If using a mouse click on the image to toggle zoom.
When in zoom mode use + or - keys to adjust level of image zoom.

Date:1950 - 1960 (c.)

Description:Henry Venables founded his timber business in Foregate Street, next to Bostock’s shoe manufactory. He made wooden packing cases for the export of shoes. He was born in Stafford in 1827 and had been working in the town since around January 1855 as a carpenter and builder.

The Foregate Street site was limited, and in order to introduce a new power driven saw mill he took out a lease from Lord Stafford on a new site in Doxey, on the outskirts of Stafford. Alongside the timber yard he built four cottages, and lived for the rest of his life at No.4 Rose Cottages. The cottages later became the company’s general offices. The business moved on to specialise in supplying English timber for wheelwrights, coachbuilders, railways, coal mining, and, later, the Manchester Ship Canal.

Henry died in 1912 and his four sons, Henry, Thomas, James and George went into partnership. The company started to specialise in high quality dry oak in 1933.

After the Second World War Venables developed a reputation for expertise in specialist timber products and projects, using a wide range of world timbers. During the 1980s and 1990s the company’s expertise and products were part of several high profile restoration projects, including the restoration of York Minster after fire, the construction of the Lantern Lobby at Windsor Castle, and the building of the Globe Theatre at Southwark and the Swan Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon.

In 1999 the business was bought out by Henry Venables Products Ltd., a new company with Tim Venables (great great grandson of the the founder Henry Venables) as managing director. Shortly afterwards, the business left its Doxey site and moved to a new home at Tollgate in Stafford.

No longer based in Stafford, the Venables business lives on in the form of Venables Brothers Ltd., specialists in European oak and timber products. Their base is now at Cheswardine in Shropshire.

Share:


Image courtesy of: Mr Chuck Venables

Donor ref:HV-05 (55/24907)

Source: Miscellaneous Collection

Copyright information: Copyrights to all resources are retained by the individual rights holders. They have kindly made their collections available for non-commercial private study & educational use. Re-distribution of resources in any form is only permitted subject to strict adherence to the usage guidelines.