Next walk: Jewellery Quarter, 9 Jan 2022

For the first walk of the new year we are going to explore Birmingham’s Jewellery Quarter and Key Hill Cemetery.

The centre of Birmingham’s industrial life in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, there’s lots to see in the Jewellery Quarter as we walk around.  For those of us with an interest in women’s history, there are lots of connections – the women pen-makers  who produced approximately three quarters of the world’s pens in the mid to late 19th century; Anne Colmore, head of the Colmore family who laid out the estate in the 17^th century; the grave of Constance Naden, a significant 19^th century poet who shared a house with a female friend and devoted herself to women’s causes.

Key Hill Cemetery, built in 1833, is a garden cemetery with winding pathways and grand buildings.  It’s a lovely place to explore and walk in and there are some very interesting people buried there.

The walk will be on pavements.  Weather conditions permitting, we may walk down a short stretch of canal towpath, but there are alternatives if that looks too slippery.

You can bring sandwiches but the jewellery quarter has lots of pubs and cafes so we may want to eat indoors in the warm.

Dogs are not permitted in the cemetery.

If anyone wants to make a longer day of it, we could finish off the day with a visit either to the Pen Museum or to the Coffin Works.  See https://penmuseum.org.uk/ and http://www.coffinworks.org/ for more details.

Contact us for details on how to go to the start of the walks.

We are still collecting for Women’s Aid, and optional donations of 1£ (or more) will be welcome.