Paul’s Silo – The Head of the Dock
By the mid-19th century, the construction of the Wet Dock had revolutionised Ipswich’s relationship with the River Orwell. The waterfront became a bustling artery of trade, where steamships and sailing vessels moored side by side, unloading goods from across the British Empire. timber, grain, coal, and exotic imports flowed through the dock, feeding the town’s growing industries and fuelling its prosperity.
In the late Victorian era, the Ipswich Waterfront was a dynamic landscape of industry, ambition, and maritime might. Long before the towering silhouette of Paul’s Silo behind you defined the skyline, this stretch of quayside was alive with the pulse of a port town at the height of its transformation.
The wharves near what would later become Paul’s Silo was served both by the tidal St. Peter’s dock, and the Wet Dock’s constant high level water after its completion in 1842. Both St. Peter’s Wharf and the quays at the Head of the Dock were always busy with shipping, as can be seen in these two photograph taken around 1900. On the corner of Foundry Lane stood Turner’s foundry, the same building that houses today’s Marinero’s restaurant. It was here that the new dock’s lock gates had been made, together with machinery to serve the adjacent mills.
The waterfront was not just a place of labour — it was a place of innovation and change as wooden sailing ships gradually gave way to iron steam ships, and as entrepreneurs invested in the latest infrastructure changing the shape and scale of the waterfront from timber-framed Tudor merchant’s warehouses to the huge structures that by 1895 were housing the latest mechanical systems of milling.
Though Paul’s Silo itself would not rise until the 20th century, the land it occupies had always been central to Ipswich’s identity — the place where it had continuously met the world for the more than 1,400 years, and where the rhythms of river and industry beat in time with the ambitions of a Victorian society.
Today, as you walk along the redeveloped waterfront, imagine the clatter of carts, the hiss of steam, and the voices of those who built Ipswich’s maritime legacy — a legacy that began right here, on the banks of the Orwell.
The photographs for this article are reproduced courtesy of the Ipswich Maritime Trust Image Archive: Leonard Woolf, Harry Walters, and William Vick Collections.
This content has been developed with generous time and expertise donations from a number of people whom we thank for their contributions. The author of the content is Stuart Grimwade.
There are six binoculars in key historic locations around the town. You can find them all here
You can also download a map kindly curated by Historic Towns Trust on their 1904 map of Ipswich, showing the location of each set of binoculars and what the town around them used to look like.
Photographs from the Ipswich Maritime Trust’s Image Archive helped inform what you see and the content on this website.
Members of the Ipswich Maritime Trust, the Historic Towns Trust, the towns’ Tourist Guide Association and other wonderful members of the public shared their expertise on the history of Ipswich to help guide the designs and keep them accurate.
Our partners at Zubr have made the technology a reality and supported the project at every step, designing the first content themselves and ensuring these are a fantastic addition to Ipswich.
Kindly funded by the Ipswich Towns Fund
If you find anything wrong with our binoculars, please let Ipswich Borough Council know by clicking this link.
Please note the binoculars may be asleep when you approach, give them a wiggle to wake them up.
Brought to you by Ipswich Central, the Business Improvement District (BID) for the town centre and waterfront thanks to Ipswich Borough Council and Towns Deal funding.
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