We visited New Lanark on drizzly day in April. I’m not sure if it’s necessarily the best sort of conditions to visit a very grey Scottish mill town, but never mind.

The best view of New Lanark is also normally your first.

As you come down the hill from the car park, you are presented with a nice little panoramic view of the entire site. Consisting of four mill buildings, several terraced housing units and a scattering of extra buildings such as a school, engine house and a church, the site is nestles tightly along a bend in the River Clyde, surrounded on all sides by wooded hills. It feels quite intimate, and has peculiarly picturesque quality to it.

The visitor centre does a good job in explaining the background of the site. However, the presentation is very modern, and doesn’t feel very in keeping with the setting. Most egregious is the weird tram-like gondolas that take through the story of one of the historical residents. I guess it’s meant for children, but I’m not sure whether they would find it engaging or not. Other slightly dubious choices include a large glass and steel bridge connecting two of the mill buildings, and an out of place (though none the less pleasant) roof garden.

The rest of the site is fine. We completed the tour, looked around the fairly standard gift shop, and spent a pleasant few hours doing some of the riverside walks (not technically part of the heritage site, but really helpful to understanding why New Lanark is built where it is). The site feels poorly presented in places, such as the Village School and Village Shop, which are more nostalgic than informative. On the other hand, I found the house of founder Robert Owen, one of the smallest buildings, to be one of the most interesting. It tells the story of his life, and his progressive views (for the time), and how they shaped our view of utopian socialism.

Overall, this site was fine. I feel, especially compared to Saltire or the Derwent Valley Mills, it’s one of the stronger industrial heritage sites in the UK, helped in no small part by its setting. It’s a perfectly fine day trip from Glasgow or Edinburgh if you’re visiting.