About Burslem Town Centre

THE CHANGING FACE OF BURSLEM
Burslem is undergoing a multi-million pound transformation to redevelop itself into a tourist destination for heritage and the creative industries. In addition, much of the vacant land left around the town centre through the loss of large manufacturing companies is now being transformed with the development of hundreds of new homes, bringing families back to generate the necessary foot-fall to sustain the local shops as well as develop the tourism hub of heritage, art and design.

BURSLEM - THE CREATIVE HEART OF NORTH STAFFORDSHIRE
The history of Burslem was built by creative people for the creative industries, and many household names originate from the town, from many years ago through to the modern day.

CERAMICS
Although the North Staffordshire area is known as the Potteries, Burslem is where it all began and why it is called "The Mother Town". Famous names like Wedgwood had their first factory in Burslem in the 1700's, remnants of which were uncovered in 1999 when the Channel 4 Time Team series came to town.

In addition, Burslem is where many other famous pottery names started out in business, such as Royal Doulton, Wade, Wood & Sons, Burleigh, Moorcroft, Dudson, Churchill, Steelite, Moorland, Price & Kensington, Enoch Wood, Living Glaze and Royal Stafford, which interestingly now also manufacturers another world-famous ceramics name, Poole Pottery, from the historic factory in Burslem town centre after both companies were rescued from administration in 2007 by the LifeStyle Group.

ARCHITECTURE
Burslem has got the richest architecture of any of the six towns which makes up the City of Stoke-on-Trent. With almost forty Grade 2 Listed structures in & around the town centre, including 16 of the City's remaining 47 bottlekilns, it is worth visiting to see the grandeur of many of the listed buildings. These include the Wedgwood Institute and the School of Art on Queen Street, the dominating Old Town Hall on Market Place which now houses the educational ceramic showcase called Ceramica, the magnificent Italian-styled St Joseph's Catholic Church on Hall Street, or to visit the splendour of the Leopard Hotel which used to be known as the "Savoy of the Midlands", has been frequented by people such James Brindley, Josiah Wedgwood & Charles Darwin, has recently featured on UK Living's Most Haunted TV series, and is about to undergo a major refurbishment to bring many of the 102 rooms back into use.