Phase one of the huge redevelopment project is nearing completion, the council has given planning permission for the remaining nine phases to create a “10-minute village” including a food hall, shops, hotel, offices and more than 800 homes.
So we thought we’d wind back the clock to see the mills being put to their original uses and also what businesses and other ventures and events have been present there more recently.
There’s also an artist’s impression of another ambitious Eckersley’s project, although that one never got off the ground.


2. The busy working life of machinists at the Irvin Diamond clothing manufacturers based in Eckersley's Mills
. Photo: STAFF

3. Sir Ben Kinglsey as Shostakovich and Terence Rigby as Stalin in the film Testimony. Many of Stalin's scenes were filmed at Eckersley's Mills in 1987
. Photo: UGC

4. p11 Eckersley Mills plan
An artist's impression of how Eckersley Mills would have looked under previous ambitious plans for the site in 2008. This project, which included the creation of a canal marina, never got off the ground though Photo: submitted