O.K. Its a misleading thread title, but bear with me there’s a point somewhere!
So this looks like a normal Moore & Wright 400 engineers square, 14” x 7“1/4 weighing in at almost 4Lb. Its a brute! Except theres no Moore & Wright markings anywhere, only YARDLEY stamped on both sides, and a mystery marking on the edge. Who is Yardley you might ask? Keep reading!
The old Yardley offices, the only London premises still standing. Yardley is a long established perfumery once based in Stratford London, with a long and colourful history, as this quote suggests
Apart from the building above, which now (of course!) is luxury flats, the old Yardley factory, and the surrounding industry is now the Olympic park in London where the 2012 olympics were held. No 105 carpenters road as shown on the map below. This whole aera was railway sidings at the bottom and engineering industry in the middle. (Out of shot at the top of the map, the Lesney “Matchbox” toy car factory once stood).
Post WW2 the British government set plans in motion for a commission for new towns, ideological towns perfectly laid out with all faculties and modern housing and industry. So Yardley up sticks in 1963 to Basildon in Essex (north of London in the then countryside).
en.wikipedia.org
Impressive huh? Obviously brutalist dreams wrapped in modern concrete combined with industry that offshores is familar and now Yardley is a retail park with vacant lots. So what does this have to do with Depeche Mode you may ask? Not a lot really except this fact (which is true despite the source as I'm born and bred very local!).
basildonhistory.wixsite.com
Which comes full circle to how I purchased a huge 4lb engineers square, potentially made by Moore & Wright three miles from a huge factory which ceased trading 28 years ago. I highly doubt Dave Gahan used it in the machine shop, or even got to darken the machine shop door, but who knows. In reality I’d imagine it left the premises for pennies on the dollar (or under someones coat!). Anyway its a cracker and I'm keeping it!
So this looks like a normal Moore & Wright 400 engineers square, 14” x 7“1/4 weighing in at almost 4Lb. Its a brute! Except theres no Moore & Wright markings anywhere, only YARDLEY stamped on both sides, and a mystery marking on the edge. Who is Yardley you might ask? Keep reading!
The old Yardley offices, the only London premises still standing. Yardley is a long established perfumery once based in Stratford London, with a long and colourful history, as this quote suggests
Apart from the building above, which now (of course!) is luxury flats, the old Yardley factory, and the surrounding industry is now the Olympic park in London where the 2012 olympics were held. No 105 carpenters road as shown on the map below. This whole aera was railway sidings at the bottom and engineering industry in the middle. (Out of shot at the top of the map, the Lesney “Matchbox” toy car factory once stood).
Post WW2 the British government set plans in motion for a commission for new towns, ideological towns perfectly laid out with all faculties and modern housing and industry. So Yardley up sticks in 1963 to Basildon in Essex (north of London in the then countryside).
New Towns Acts - Wikipedia
Impressive huh? Obviously brutalist dreams wrapped in modern concrete combined with industry that offshores is familar and now Yardley is a retail park with vacant lots. So what does this have to do with Depeche Mode you may ask? Not a lot really except this fact (which is true despite the source as I'm born and bred very local!).
@BasildonHistory
Which comes full circle to how I purchased a huge 4lb engineers square, potentially made by Moore & Wright three miles from a huge factory which ceased trading 28 years ago. I highly doubt Dave Gahan used it in the machine shop, or even got to darken the machine shop door, but who knows. In reality I’d imagine it left the premises for pennies on the dollar (or under someones coat!). Anyway its a cracker and I'm keeping it!
