Location of Cadbury's Factory

When considering how I could create some site specific typography of my own, I started by researching where the Cadbury's Factory was located prior to it's move to Bournville. I knew it must be somewhere in what we now consider to be the city centre.

John Cadbury opened his shop at 93 Bull Lane, it later became Barrow's Stores. This was located on what is now Corporation Street.

In 1831 he rented a small factory in Crooked Lane to make his own drinking chocolate and cocoa powder. Crooked lane seems to have run from Cherry Lane to the end of Bull Street, approximately where Martineau Square now is. The map below shows in yellow the proposed route for Corporation Street. Crooked Lane can be seen in purple.

 Below left is an illustartion of Cadbury's first factory and on the right is a photo of buildings in Crooked Lane before it was demolished.

In 1847 Cadbury moved to a larger factory on Bridge Street. This still exists off Broad Street opposite the new Library of Birmingham. The canal wharf used by Cadbury is partly there still leading onto Gas Street Basin. An illustration of this factory and a contemporary map are shown below.

I took some photographs of what businesses were currently occupying the sites of these two factories.

Bridge Street is dominated by the giant Hyatt Hotel and the closed down Brindley pub, but the wharf may still be recognisable to John Cadbury.

The location of Crooked Lane is less easy to pin point, but the area seems to be home to betting shops, pawn brokers, loan companies and the obligatory fast food shops. This may be a more interesting location to consider.