THE drive through Bailiff Bridge proved to be an emotional journey for Dr Lisa Taylor - in more ways than one.

Sweeping along Birkby Lane passed the hole in the ground where Firths Carpets, one of the area’s largest employers once stood, there was an almost tangible sadness within the confines of the car in which she and her father were travelling.

“I always got a sense he was feeling emotional sadness. It was like an atmosphere in the car and I noted it several times,” recalls Lisa.

Lisa’s parents Jim, now deceased, and Nancie, both worked at Firths in Bailiff Bridge. Jim was a quality control manager and Nancie worked in setting.

Keeping it in the family, Lisa followed in her parents’ footsteps when she joined the mill’s workforce doing filing in the summers of 1985 and 1986.

“It has tremendous meaning for me and when people are telling me about their memories they don’t realise they are talking about mine too in many respects,” says Lisa.

She talks of the mill’s international importance manufacturing high quality carpets, including Wilton and Axminster woven carpets.

Inspired by the mourning of the mill’s loss apparent among many workers like her father, Lisa, principal lecturer in cultural studies and humanities at Leeds Beckett University, managed to secure funding through the University for her ‘Landscapes of Loss’ exhibition.

The exhibition, including information and photographs collated during focus groups and ‘walk and talk’ interviews during the seven month research project, runs until the end of October at Bailiff Bridge Library, Devon Way, Brighouse.

The firm was demolished in 2002 leaving a gaping space, but for many like Lisa and her family the legacy of Firths is as strong as ever.

“People loved and lived it. It wasn’t just work,” says Lisa.