Birmingham
Workshop of the World that showed Adam Smith how to scale production—Birmingham lost 191,000 factory jobs but now fields Europe's youngest major-city population (40% under 25) in a bet on demographic reinvention.
Birmingham invented the modern factory before anyone called it a factory. In the 18th century, the city's 'toy trade'—small metal goods from buttons to buckles to gun barrels—organized production into specialized workshops where each artisan performed one step of a multi-stage process. Adam Smith's pin factory, the foundational example in 'The Wealth of Nations,' drew on exactly this kind of Birmingham production. Matthew Boulton's Soho Manufactory, built in 1766, mass-produced everything from silverware to steam engines in partnership with James Watt. The Industrial Revolution did not begin in Birmingham, but Birmingham showed the world how to scale it.
By the 19th century, Birmingham was the 'Workshop of the World'—a title that stuck for a century. The city produced everything from pens to pistols, jewelry to railways components. The Gun Quarter armed the British Empire. The Jewelry Quarter, still operating today, once produced 40% of all jewelry made in the UK. This extreme manufacturing diversity was Birmingham's insurance policy: unlike Manchester (cotton) or Sheffield (steel), Birmingham never depended on a single industry.
Deindustrialization hit anyway. Between 1971 and 1987, Birmingham lost 191,000 manufacturing jobs—nearly half its industrial workforce. The city spent decades rebuilding around financial services, higher education, and the creative economy. HS2 (High Speed Two), the railway linking Birmingham to London in 49 minutes, was designed to make the city a viable alternative to the capital for businesses priced out of London—though the project's northern leg was cancelled in 2023, limiting the transformation.
Birmingham today is the UK's second-largest city with over 1.1 million residents and the youngest population of any major European city—40% under 25. That demographic dividend, combined with five universities producing 25,000 graduates annually, gives Birmingham raw material for reinvention. Whether the city can convert youth into economic dynamism—or whether young Brummies simply migrate to London—will determine if Birmingham becomes a genuine second city or remains London's talent farm.