Leeds-based Brouns & Co, the UK’s only manufacturer of linseed paint and one of just a handful of producers worldwide, is playing a key role in a £4m project breathing new life into a historic quarter of Wakefield.
The city’s Upper Westgate Heritage Action Zone has provided grants to businesses since 2020 to enable them to renovate and invest in more than 20 historically significant buildings, many of which were vacant and had fallen into disrepair.
The four-year partnership initiative between Historic England and Wakefield Council is using Brouns & Co’s linseed paint as part of the renovation process.
Britt Harwood of Mirfield-based Inc. Architecture, a specialist conservation architect who works predominantly on historic buildings and was the overseeing architect on the Wakefield scheme, said: “Using linseed paint was crucial to this important regeneration project. Not only is it virtually identical to the original paint that would have been used on these buildings when they were first built, and even made using the same, traditional process, it also has far superior longevity and durability to plastic-based paint.”
She added: “Brouns & Co colour-matched the historic paint shades for us and on some buildings we also used their own historic colours. The fact that they make the paint right here in Yorkshire is a bonus and has helped reduce the environmental impact of the project.”
Brouns & Co linseed paint was used to restore the exteriors of Westgate’s Nocturno, Flares and After Dark nightclubs, as well as the Elephant and Castle pub, among a number of the historic street’s other listed buildings.
Brouns CEO Michiel Brouns said: “We’re really proud that our paint was used on this important regeneration project which has had such a positive effect on this historic area of Wakefield and helped to bring these streets back to life.”
The linseed paint manufacturing process, which Brouns & Co has returned to Yorkshire for the first time since the 19th century, involves oil from flax seed grown and pressed in Collingham, being triple-milled with ground natural pigments to create paint in a range of authentic colours.
Brouns & Co’s paint is used by many historic properties including Chatsworth House in Derbyshire, the restoration of Wentworth Woodhouse near Rotherham, and English Heritage-owned Brodsworth Hall near Doncaster, as well as by architects and developers.
