page_title: Woollen industry in Wales
section_title: South Wales
hierarchical_section_title: Woollen industry in Wales / Industrial era / South Wales
caption_attribution_description: English: The River Brenig at Tregaron
context_page_description: The woollen industry in Wales was at times the country's most important industry, though it often struggled to compete with the better-funded woollen mills in the north of England, and almost disappeared during the 20th century. There is continued demand for quality Welsh woollen products.
  Wool processing includes removing the fleece by shearing, classing the wool by quality, untangling, carding and spinning it into yarn, which may be knitted or woven into cloth, then finishing the cloth by fulling, napping and pressing.
  Spinning and weaving of sheep's wool dates to prehistoric times in Wales, but only became an important industry when Cistercian monasteries were established in the 12th century.
  Water-powered fulling mills to finish the cloth enabled rapid expansion of the industry in the 13th century, although spinning and weaving continued to be a cottage industry.
  In the early 16th century production shifted from south Wales to mid and north Wales. The Shrewsbury Drapers Company in England took a dominant role in distributing Welsh cloth.
context_section_description: During the Industrial Revolution the  Teifi Valley between Ceredigion and Carmarthenshire came to employ thousands of weavers, spinners, dyers, knitters, drapers and tailors.
  The river and its tributaries powered dozens of mills, and sheep in the surrounding grassland supplied fleeces to be made into woollen products.
  In 1837 a Working Men's Association was established in the south Wales weaving town of Carmarthen in response to the Chartist campaign for democratic rights. 
  By the summer of 1839 three more towns in the region had founded such societies, and the first Chartist convention had been held.
  While manufacturing declined in mid-Wales after the 1860s, the weaving industry grew in villages in south-west Wales, which did well until the 1920s.
  Skilled workers moved from mid-Wales to the Teifi Valley, mainly to the area around Dre-fach Felindre, Pentrecwrt, Henllan and Llandysul. 
  A railway was opened from Carmarthen to Lampeter in 1864, and large mills were developed such as the Alltcafan and Derw factories at Pentrecwrt.
  Dre-fach Felindre was once called "The Huddersfield of Wales" for its wool industry.
  The Cambrian Mills in this village made blankets, shawls, stockings and other products for local sale and for export.
  The water-powered factories in the south west were completely dependent on demand from the nearby South Wales coalfield, whose workers preferred Welsh goods. 
  They could not compete with the mills of northern England in other markets.
  The Teifi Valley Railway, opened in 1895, further strengthened the link from the rural south west to the industrial south.
  The woollen industry flourished in South Wales until the end of World War I (1914–18), with high prices during the war.
  At one time there were more than 300 active woollen mills.
  The woollen mills of the Teifi valley were hard-hit by the drop in purchasing power of miners during the depression in the coal trade of the 1920s.
  In the inter-war period (1918–39) most woollen manufacturers did not adapt to changes in fashion and were forced to close.
  Small clusters of hand loom weaving survived in places such as Lampeter where there were spinners and fullers, making quality goods. 
  A weaver said of this work, "One can make a fair living by it, but a man can never get rich at it."
  The number of active mills dropped from 250 in 1926 to 81 in 1947 and 24 in 1974, increasingly concentrated in industrial centres.
  However, the invention of the double weave and light tweeds caused significant growth in demand for Welsh textiles.
  When Burberry bought the Treorchy plant in the 1980s, 75% of the workers were women.
  The plant was closed in March 2007.
caption: River Brenig, Teifi tributary, in Tregaron. The Tregaron area had a number of water-driven woollen mills and was a centre for manufacture of knitted hosiery.[50]
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