Coffin Works

Newman Brothers at The Coffin Works is a museum in the Newman Brothers Coffin Furniture Factory building in Birmingham’s Jewellery Quarter. The factory opened in 1894 and made brass coffin fittings until 1998. The Grade II* listed building stands at 13–15 Fleet Street, designed by Roger Harley in 1892. The company began as a brass foundry in 1882, run by Alfred and Edwin Newman. After Edwin left in 1895, Alfred ran the firm alone until 1933. The factory supplied handles, crucifixes and nameplates for funerals of statesmen and royalty. Sir Winston Churchill and Princess Diana were among those buried with its fittings. At its peak in the 1950s and 1960s the firm employed about a hundred people and exported goods to West Africa, India and Canada. Joyce Green, who joined in 1949, became owner in 1989 and led the campaign to save the building. After the company closed in 1998, the Birmingham Conservation Trust restored the site and opened it as a museum in 2014. Visitors follow guided tours through the restored stamp room, shroud room and warehouse. The original 19th-century workshop remains, with its slate roof repaired and Welsh slates reinstated. The courtyard and gated cart entrance have been preserved, and the 1960s offices now house small local businesses. The museum tells the story of the workers who made the fittings and the families who ran the firm for over a century.