At the start of the 19^th century, the hosiery trade provided most of the employment in Leicester. The collapse of framework knitting after 1820 was a disaster but the second half of the century saw an upturn in the city’s fortunes.

 

Cheaper fuel for manufacturing industries and cheaper coal for domestic use saw the expansion of cities throughout England. In Leicester new trades – boot and shoe manufacture, elastic web trade and engineering – were introduced following the opening of Leicester and Swannington Railway in 1832. The population grew by nearly 40% in 1860s. By 1871 the population of the city exceeded 95,000.

 

Many of those who contributed to Leicester’s Arts & Crafts heritage were born in the 1860s. They came from typical East Midlands working class families who had prospered as part of the Industrial Revolution.

 

Ernest Gimson was the grandson of a carpenter. His father, Josiah Gimson, had begun his working life as an iron founder and machinist. In the 1840s he and his brother set up Gimson and Company making heavy machinery. He became a well-known and respected figure in the community and in 1877 was elected to the city council as a liberal.

 

George Bankart came from a family of woolstaplers. His father however was a successful insurance broker in Leicester.

Harry Peach’s father came from a Nottinghamshire family of drapers and lace-makers. He met his wife in Toronto while he was in Canada on business. Harry, their eldest son, was born there but the family returned to England when he was three years old settling in Oadby, near Leicester.