The increased output of this period was encouraged by rising grain prices and the demands of an increasingly urban population, and enabled by the expansion of the cultivated area (especially from the 1790s to 1815), the continued reorganisation and enlargement of holdings and the final phase of the enclosure of open fields - concentrated in the Midland counties. The high-input/high-output systems of the ‘High Farming’ years of the 1840s to 1870s, were based on the availability of imported artificial fertilisers, manures and feeds, and replaced the ‘closed circuit’ methods that relied on farm-produced feeds and manure on many farms.
Substantially complete examples of farm buildings of the 1750–1840 period are far less common than those of the post-1840 period, when many farmsteads matured into their present form and huge numbers of buildings were erected – particularly for cattle. Some, particularly the planned courtyard farmsteads of the period, represent new developments in farmstead planning or the architectural aspirations of landowners. Others continue to be strongly representative of both the variety and development of local and regional agricultural systems and local vernacular traditions.
To read about Historical Development in a national context from 1880 to 1940, please click here.
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