The museum contains exhibits dating from the 18th and 19th centuries that show the history of textiles, clothing and engine and locomotive manufacture in the area. During the regular ‘working weekends’, several exhibits are operated including water wheels, a steam engine and the great spinning ‘mules’.
It also illustrates the history of cinema projections, including the world’s first moving pictures – filmed in Leeds by Louis le Prince in 1888 – as well as 1920s silent movies.
There have been mills on the Armley Mills site since the 17th century. The original buildings having been developed in the late 18th century when a woollen mill and a corn mill were built.