1. History & Background

On the edge of the Sussex countryside, just outside West Hoathly, stood one of the region’s brickmaking plants operated by Ibstock Brick Ltd, one of the UK’s largest manufacturers. The site once produced bricks for housing and industry across the South East, tapping into local clay reserves that had long made this part of Sussex a brick and tile hub.

By the late 20th and early 21st century, demand shifted and production centralised into larger, more modern plants. Smaller rural works like West Hoathly became uneconomic. The works fell silent, joining a familiar story of industrial decline.

2. First Impressions

The site lies tucked into woodland, hidden from casual view. Approaching, the first signs are rusting security fencing and a long, weed-choked track once used by lorries. Beyond, the shell of the brickworks rises—sheds of corrugated iron and steel trusses, their roofs patched and buckling.

Even before entering, there’s an unmistakable tang in the air: damp clay, rust, and the mustiness of forgotten machinery.

3. Interior Walkthrough

• Kiln Halls
  Vast brick chambers dominate the core of the site. Their arched mouths are soot-blackened, with conveyor rails still snaking overhead. The kilns are silent now, but the sheer heat they once gave off feels almost palpable as you stand inside their husks.
• Drying Sheds
  Long, low buildings with rows of racks where bricks were left to cure. Now, shafts of light slice through holes in the roof, casting patterns across cracked concrete floors littered with shards of brick and moss.
• Control Rooms
  Small cabins with peeling paint and smashed glass. Old switchboards and panels cling to the walls, their labels (“Kiln Fan 2”, “Main Conveyor”) just readable under layers of dust.
• Workshops
  Scattered with abandoned spanners, rusting oil cans, and the skeletal remains of forklifts and trolleys. A calendar curls on the wall, frozen in a year decades past.

4. Sounds & Stillness

What was once deafening—machines grinding, fans roaring, forklifts reversing—is now replaced with dripping water, the flutter of pigeons in the rafters, and the occasional crash of a sheet of rusting metal in the wind. The silence is heavy, broken only by your own footsteps crunching over brick fragments.

5. Exterior & Yard

Outside, the clay pits are half-filled with rainwater, now small lakes where reeds and birch saplings thrive. Graffiti marks the exterior walls, bright colour on fading brick. Piles of discarded tiles and broken bricks form strange sculptural mounds, softened by moss and weeds.

The chimney—slim and stubborn—still pierces the skyline, a landmark to anyone approaching West Hoathly from the south.

6. Reflection

The Ibstock Brickworks at West Hoathly embodies a kind of industrial melancholy. Once a place of intense labour, it now feels like a time capsule of an industry that shaped the landscape yet left quietly when demand changed. The kilns and sheds are monumental in their decay, half-consumed by nature, half-clinging to their industrial identity.

It’s not a glamorous site, but its power lies in atmosphere: the smell of clay, the echo of industry, the uncanny stillness where once thousands of bricks passed through daily.

For the urban explorer, it’s a story of transformation—from clay to brick, from noise to silence, from industry to ruin.