19-04-2025
I visited the chocolate-box village that popped up out of nowhere and no one knows why
Situated in the heart of the Black Country is a tiny village you've probably never heard of.
Located on the bend of Quarry Road inbetween Quarry Bank and Cradley Heath, it would be easy to miss the entrance to Mushroom Green if it weren't for a small road sign.
The Black Country region was historically made up of little towns and villages like this, which have all since been swallowed up by urban sprawl.
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But Mushroom Green appears to have survived and kept its distinct character.
The small settlement is actually a hamlet, rather than a village.
It's history goes back at least four hundred years, where it was once the home of nail-makers and then chain-makers.
Today, it's home to narrow and winding picture postcard streets, lined with cottages and terraced houses, each one beautifully kept and decorated. There's a lot of greenery here, too.
The hamlet is located near a small stream called Black Brook and it has a footpath entrance leading to Saltwells Nature Reserve.
Mushroom Green is thought to house the last surviving chain-making shop in the world that's still on its original site.
The workshop, called Mushroom Green Chainshop, is voluntarily run today by sculptor Luke Perry, 41, and his wife Natalie, 40, opening on the second Sunday of every month from April to October.
The Grade-ll listed building - which was built in the 1860s - oozes character and looks like something straight out of the Black Country Living Museum.
The history here goes back centuries.
In the 17th century, historians say the main occupation of Mushroom Green residents was nail making.
But when machine-made nails were introduced in nearby Birmingham in around 1830, the "poor nail-makers (of Mushroom Green) could not compete with the speed or price", historians say.
As a result, the Mushroom Green nail-makers adapted their tools to make small chains in their workshops, usually located in their backyards or brewhouses.
Meanwhile, Mushroom Green is believed to have earnt its name in the early 1800s, deriving from make-shift buildings that 'popped up like mushrooms' due to the Land Enclosures Acts.
These acts, carried out by the government, saw common land and open fields brought under private ownership.
Mr Perry, who has run Mushroom Green Chainshop for the past 18 years, said: "We believe that when the enclosures act began, which I think would have been around the early 1800s, that was done likely because of the assumption that land generally needed to be managed better because of the Napoleonic Wars, and the lack of the ability to farm enough, efficiently, to feed the country.
"This (area of Dudley) was under the jurisdiction of the Earl of Dudley, so I believe that when the enclosures act happened, they gave them (the local residents) a month, or perhaps two weeks, I'm not sure, and they said for any dwelling, with a roof on, by the end of that date, you'll be able to keep it inhabitable in that land, it will be yours.
"This particular area, which I think was rich for industrial capacity - because of the fact there is coal right under the ground, like, literally, you could dig up and get some coal, and iron and limestone, and all the things you need for metal working - people knew that they wanted to settle here.
"It was good farmland, and there was a ley (clearing) in the woods. Cradley is (named) because of a break in the woods.
"It became a really popular area for people to build a house within that short period and put a roof on it. And they shot up like mushrooms, hence the name Mushroom Green... allegedly."
Local historians say Mushroom Green is probably the "best remaining example of an unplanned squatters industrial hamlet" remaining in the Black Country.
They added: "These hamlets together with several towns made up the Black Country area before the industrial revolution swept through and swallowed them up."
