Kastix Ltd
History
Built in 1947 as the new drill hall for the 2nd Volunteer Battalion West Riding Regiment. Later used as the offices for Kastix, a textile company producing womenswear and children's clothing, which went in to receivership in 2001 with the loss of more than 50 jobs. Conversion plans There are currently plans to demolish the site to construct an Aldi supermarket.
The exterior
Bit out of the way... but was in the area so decided to take a look. Its a fair size and considering it's had no owners since 2001 the condition of the place is pretty decent. Stopping at the top of the road and checking for hostiles we decided to take a closer look. Theres lots of works adjacent and we attracted quite a few spectators as we scrambled through the fencing... moving in we could see there were a few CCTV cameras, rusty and outdated these were perhaps part of the security measures when the building was last working. Starting at the front and working our way to the back (drawn quite a crowd at this point) we were intrigued to find an entry point. The exterior is fitting with the period and will be a shame when the building is demolished to make way for the plastic prefabs that are ALDI. Most of the windows and doors are original but it looks like efforts were made to modernise the building at some point.
Scaling the roof... checking for open doors windows (bingo).. we were in.
The interior
Making our way through a small room and then into a much larger hall we were a little taken back by the size of the building... Strewn garments, hangers and palettes of junk made us a little unsettled and it was almost like a worker was about to appear and escort us off the premises (or maybe try sell us some clothing). Making our way past the left overs we headed to the doors littered across the back of the building. slowly working through the rooms we came to the main stairwell... making our way to the upper floors...we made our way through the many offices, empty and miscellaneous rooms ending in an area with some pretty creepy looking changing rooms. Overall theres a few cool bits and in our opinion its worth documenting if not for the very creepy mannequins, the overall condition or the asthetics the sheer amount of stuff left over from previous occupiers. There also an attic area which was a little difficult to reach but it did look like someone had gone to the effort to investigate.
That concludes the explore...
