in Kids & Family at in Tipton Road, nr Birmingham

All year round

The Black Country, a region of 400 square miles to the west of Birmingham, was at the heart of Britain's Industrial Revolution in the late 18th century. The area's rich industrial heritage is brought to life at the Black Country Living Museum.

The 26-acre site features historic buildings from the 19th and early-20th centuries which have been moved from their original locations to offer visitors a picture of working conditions and social life during the industrial era. The buildings themselves are brought to life by costumed interpreters who are steeped in local history and by some 40,000 items in the collection that cover the area's history.

The Black Country - so-called because of the engines which belched black smoke into the sky and also after the shallow, wide seams of coal mined from the area - produced iron and steel, canals, coal and limestone mining, motor vehicles, locks and keys, ships, anchors, nails and chains, glassware and real ales.

The region was described as "Black by day and red by night" by Elihu Burritt, the American Consul to Birmingham in 1862 and other authors, from Dickens to Shenstone, refer to the intensity of manufacturing in the Black Country and its effect on the landscape and its people.

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