Standing beside a machine older than her grandfather, Tessa Oldroyd feeds clay through a clanky mechanism driven by iron cogs that have been turning for more than a century. In her hands, Britain's tile-making past is very much alive. But a dozen miles away, its future is being reshaped.
The clay, most of which is dug from the Humber Estuary, arrives in heavy blocks at William Blyth in Barton-upon-Humber, North Lincolnshire, where Oldroyd is the only woman in a male-dominated workplace of 24 workers. She explains how one block is placed into a machine affectionately nicknamed "the stupid", before the cogs turn and "squeeze the clay through a plate, extruding it into tiles", which are then baked in its coal-fired kiln. This is how roof pantiles have been made for generations at the site, which dates back to the 1840s.
“Tessa Oldroyd works at 186-year-old William Blyth tile works, one of a dozen traditional firms surviving economic pressures.”
Pantiles – the distinctive curved tiles seen on rooftops across Britain – are still produced by about a dozen traditional companies surviving across the UK, according to the Roof Tile Association. William Blyth, founded in 1840, is among them. The machine Oldroyd uses dates back to the 1920s; some equipment on site is much older, and the work is far from easy. "The most challenging thing for me probably would be lifting the clay," she says. "I'm glad to be actually making history. When I think about this site and how old it is and we're still carrying on this tradition and the fact that lots of the tiles, if not all of them, will be here for hundreds of years to come."
Her work is part of a tradition stretching back centuries. Though clay roof tiles were introduced by the Romans, the English industry grew up in the eastern part of the country during the 12th century. By the early 1700s, pantiles were being made, with East Yorkshire and Lincolnshire becoming major centres of production.
But in recent years, traditional manufacturers in the British ceramics sector have faced pressures including rising energy prices, higher labour costs and competition from cheaper imports. The 200-year-old Denby Pottery fired its final pieces earlier this month before permanently blowing out its kilns. It prompted the chancellor to announce a £120m support package to help the sector. "It's an incredibly difficult situation at the moment," says Noble Francis, economics director at the Construction Products Association. Energy alone can account for up to a third of costs in ceramics production – a burden that threatens to extinguish the very traditions Oldroyd is working to preserve.