Swinden House
Encyclopedia
Swinden House in Rotherham
Rotherham
Rotherham is a town in South Yorkshire, England. It lies on the River Don, at its confluence with the River Rother, between Sheffield and Doncaster. Rotherham, at from Sheffield City Centre, is surrounded by several smaller settlements, which together form the wider Metropolitan Borough of...

, South Yorkshire
South Yorkshire
South Yorkshire is a metropolitan county in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England. It has a population of 1.29 million. It consists of four metropolitan boroughs: Barnsley, Doncaster, Rotherham, and City of Sheffield...

, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 is a Victorian style
Victorian architecture
The term Victorian architecture refers collectively to several architectural styles employed predominantly during the middle and late 19th century. The period that it indicates may slightly overlap the actual reign, 20 June 1837 – 22 January 1901, of Queen Victoria. This represents the British and...

 Grade II listed Victorian
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...

 building. It is located on Tata Steel
Tata Steel
Tata Steel is a multinational steel company headquartered in Jamshedpur, India and part of Tata Group. It is the world's seventh-largest steel company, with an annual crude steel capacity of 31 million tonnes, and the largest private-sector steel company in India measured by domestic production...

' (formally British Steel then Corus) Swinden Technology Centre.

Pre-steel 1880-1946

It was built between 1878 and 1880 by Thomas W Badger a member of a well-known Rotherham family, prominent in legal circles and was originally called Red House or as it was frequently termed the “palatial residence”. Several of the rooms on the ground floor are panelled in oak which was obtained from Rotherham Parish Church during the construction of the house.

In 1882 Thomas Badger fled the country[reported by the Rotherham Advertiser], leaving his business in financial confusion and with heavy debts. The house was sold to William H Micklethwait, the owner of an iron foundry at the Clough Works in Masbrough. His lived there until his death in 1925 and his widow continued to live there until she died in 1932.

The house remaining empty until 1939 when it was occupied by the National Fire service during the Second World War.

Steel industry 1946-2005

In 1946 it was purchased by United Steel and the house was renamed Swinden House in tribute to the first director of research, Dr T Swinden. After considerable refurbishment the house became occupied by research staff.

Swinden House remained as a research centre for the next 60 years, changing ownership in 1995 to British Steel PLC, and then again in 1999 to Corus PLC as a result of the merger with Koninklijke Hoogovens. Now owned by Tata Steel.

National Metals Technology Centre (NAMTEC) and Swinden House Conference Centre 2005-2011

In 2005 NAMTEC moved into Swinden House. Currently managing membership for the Special Metals Forum (SMF) and Titanium Information Group (TIG). NAMTEC also provides project management and technical consultancy for Advanced Engineering and Material companies. It also co-ordinates AEM Futures.

Swinden House now offers meeting rooms and conference facilities. The actual house is set in quiet and pleasant grounds within easy access of the M1 and M18, close to Rotherham and Sheffield, making it a perfect venue for local, regional and national meetings. Swinden House has 9 meeting rooms available which hold between 2-80 delegates. The most popular room is the 24-seater Micklethwait room, named after Mr WH Micklethwait owner of the building in the 1800s and local business man at the time. All meeting rooms have audio-visual equipment and complimentary broadband internet access in every room.

Since it opened over 40,000 people have used the facilities at Swinden House with local companies visiting time and time again.

External links

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