3 or 4 nights in Birmingham?

I think that Birmingham would be a good choice for what you wish to do.

You don't say how you will travel - car or public transport?

Dorset is lovely but you may also wish to consider NW Wales as an alternative as it has direct trains from Birmingham to both the Cambrian Coast and north coast. Porthmadog would make a good base if using the Cambrian line and Conwy if going to the north coast. (Dorset also has direct trains from Birmingham to Bournemouth - which is a large seaside town. West Dorset is more rural).
https://www.visitwales.com/destinations/north-wales/explore-cambrian-coast-railway-line

Google “Ironbridge” and see if that interests you - it’s the town below the first ever bridge made of iron, and symbolic of the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.

I think you are very much on track here for your expressed interests, it sounds like you have already done some sound research. Don't forget the pivotal role of the Canals.
Bournville with it's worker's village for the Chocolate factory should also be on your agenda IMO.

Hi MapLady -

While Birmingham isn’t exactly tourist central, it would be an ideal base for seeing sites connected to the history of the Industrial Revolution. The longer you stay, the more options there are to see more - maybe it’s a case of how long before you get museum-ed out!

Ian

The Industrial Revolution was wide ranging and there are interesting things to see related to this period of history in many places. You can ride in heritage steam trains and there’s the National Railway museum in York. You don’t necessarily need to go to an industrial city like Birmingham to see pivotal sites.

Coal mining was imperative to the revolution so the Big Pit in Wales might be interesting. In Northumberland you can see the birthplace of George Stephenson and the open cast mining country (now closed and very peaceful!) that inspired him to invent the steam engine. In Bristol you can see the SS Great Britain and Suspension Bridge by the engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel, one of the key figures of the age.

As Helen says there are plenty of places you could base yourselves at to see Industrial Revolution sights. But Birmingham is as good as any and I'd stick to that. particularly given the research on the area you have already done. You could maybe add some time in Bristol on the way to Dorset?
Ironbridge is for me the outstanding site in the area. You need at least a full day to see everything there, maybe even an overnight stay. The Black Country Museum a close second. Don't miss the National Trust's Back to Back Houses in the centre of Birmingham -https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/visit/birmingham-west-midlands/birmingham-back-to-backs. These need booking in advance because of the restricted size.
It's quite a joy to see a trip planned that doesn't go to Bath, Oxford, the Cotswolds or York.

I guess I’m just thinking that, as much as I like Birmingham, I wouldn’t necessarily want to go on holiday there. It’s not the pretty old English town that visitors often want to see. It’s a large, built up, working, very multicultural city.

I’m certainly not saying don’t visit. I’ve had many fun weekends there. But there are other options if the OP prefers somewhere quieter and more the typical tourist idea of England.

Sorry, when you research other places in the UK to visit, Birmingham comes up way down the list.

We have toured the UK a lot and the one thing I remember about Birmingham is the heavy traffic trying to pass through the area.

We did Stratford Upon Avon and Warwick Castle without staying in a big city. The English countryside is great.

For an Industrial Revolution look round Birmingham is very nearly perfect.

The plentiful coal, limestone and iron ore made the industrial revolution possible, but the canals made it happen. Without the canals all that nice new china from the Potteries and glass from Stourbridge, as well as the iron from the Black Country would have just laid about. Everything moved by narrowboat.

and Birmingham has canals in spades. The Warwick flight is magnificent, the Stratford Canal is bucolic, Gas House Basin in the heart of Birmingham is like Times Square. Canals head off in all directions, and they are all free to walk next to on the towpaths - look for grooves left where the tow ropes went through, both the stone abutments of bridges throughout the network but even in the iron bridges and abutments on the Stratford Canal where the rope was passed through a slot in the centre of the bridges.

You can visit the locks - all still worked by hand, although now mostly for pleasure boats, and you can ride on either a one hours cruise or hire a boat for half or whole day, or when you visit the Black Country Museum they run electric boats in the Dudley Canal tunnel right next to the Museum.

Long story short - plenty to do in much longer than suggested in the OP - so go for it.

Definitely go for it!

Birmingham is much under rated but does have a lot to recommend itself if you are interested in the industrial revolution. Birmingham has a very good Museum of Science and Industry. Birmingham has over 35 miles of canals (more than Venice). Explore them on this short walk,

Ironbridge is a World Hertitage site and by the close of the C18th was the most technologically advanced area in the world. its associated museums could easily fill a couple of days .

The Black Country Museum is another full, day and don't miss the canal boat trip throught the tunnel)

It will also make a complete contrast to Dorset.

I got pilloried on this forum last time I said that Birmingham had more canals than Venice. It is an oft quoted fact stated by many people far more knowledgeable about canals than me. But whoever it was who pulled me up short was adamant in his or her "facts"- it depended apparently on what you call "Venice" and what you call "Birmingham".
Whatever the truth of it, and whatever the exact mileage, you can't avoid canals in the Birmingham area.

It really annoyed me as someone who has walked the entire navigable system and very large parts of the un-navigable or abandoned system as far north as Dingwall. One of those walks that happened totally by accident, from seeing a signpost on the Regent's Canal. And I've also travelled a good part of the connected system by boat.

In many of the canal bridges in central Birmingham, and on the wider Birmingham Canal Navigations you will see little red doors. They were installed during WW2 to be able to pump canal water to fight fires caused by the Blitz, most are still maintained the same way as you would conventional fire hydrants.

Thank you all for your very informative and thoughtful comments. There is a lot for me to unpack and note here.

James - We will be using public transportation. We are willing to use taxis as necessary. This is a good question, and I will add this bit to my original post. Although I agree with you that Wales would make more sense instead of Dorset, I will unapologetically say that I have my heart set on Dorset this time. I have been dreaming of that part for decades and was supposed to visit in 2020.

Amanda - yes, Ironbridge and Black Country Living Museum are both on my list.

Stuart - I am adding the canals and Cadbury/Bourneville to my list.

Ian - yes, my list is growing longer and longer!! There is definitely enough for a 4-night stay. I'm going to have to prioritize!

Helen - My husband does not seem to be looking for "pretty", especially as we will get quite a bit of that in Dorset, but I will definitely discuss this with my husband. We hope to ride the Swanage heritage railway in Dorset. I have noted your other suggestions for industrial revolution sites, especially as Wales, Bristol and York are on my radar for future trips.  

John - Yes, how could I forget the back-to-back houses?? Thank you for repairing my omission. It's going to be interesting to schedule that though - since they are 'open' for such a narrow window in the middle of the day.

Geovagriffith - Good to know. I will run this by my husband before we make a final decision.

Nigel - thank you for the details. A lot of this sounds very intriguing, especially the canals and the locks. Definitely looks like there is enough for 4 nights!!

Wasleys - Adding the Museum of Science and Industry to my growing list!!

tl;dr - Thank you very much for giving us so many ideas. I will discuss this with my husband and decide if we want to base ourselves in Birmingham. If we do decide on Birmingham, it will definitely be for 4 nights. We will be using public transport, so once I do some more research, I will be asking questions about logistics. We hope the Dorset part will be a good contrast to this part of the trip (the rough idea is to base ourselves in Wareham and my top four there are Corfe Castle, Swanage, Lulworth Cove, Brownsea Island).

well I'm not going to get involved in what is a distinct side issue, as we don't want anybody piloried around here

As I said up thread, the canals are well worth visiting, walking or riding on to see the heritage of the Industrial Revolution

@ Nigel - where would be the best place to walk along a canal tow path and see a lock in terms of time efficiency? It is very evident now that we are not going to have enough time to do everything we want in Birmingham.

Map Lady - there is a big flight of locks right in the centre of the city - Farmers Bridge drop the Birmingham & Fazeley canal down through 12 or 13 locks* towards Aston through a series of tower blocks. They are very easy to see. They start opposite the Sea Life centre. You can also get a short cruise on the canals from that area.

• Can’t remember which without going into the other room for my guidebook!

This is the short cruise- https://sherbornewharf.co.uk/boat-trips/daily-public-boat-trips

Not sure why its the 2022 website as they were (or an identical company) there in Summer 2023. I saw them. Yes the Farmers Bridge 13 lock flight is as good a place as any, for a taster- right in the City Centre.

MapLady, it's late night in the UK, so Nigel will possibly answer your question to him in the morning.

Meanwhile......about Warwick Castle and Stratford-upon-Avon as day trips from Birmingham.
Another option is to pack up and leave Birmingham and check into a hotel in Stratford-upon-Avon.

Stratford-upon-Avon is a relaxing place and there is plenty to see and do.
In my opinion, a day trip doesn't do it justice.
Onward travel is easy from Stratford-upon-Avon and Warwick.

You can reach Warwick, which is a very short distance away from SUA by train, taxi, or bus.
See Warwick Castle, walk around town to see the other medieval buildings.
You can then either return to Stratford-upon-Avon for the night or hop on the train at Warwick and take it through Oxford and onward to London.
Or onward to Dorset.
Warwick Castle does have luggage storage for small or carry on bags.

I hope you can make time in your itinerary to do this.
Perhaps you can steal two nights away from Dorset.
Or steal one night from Birmingham and one from Dorset.

John & Stuart - I looked up the area on a map, and it is definitely very doable.

Rebecca - I think we will be quite busy in and around Birmingham, so we are thinking of not doing the day trips this time. I agree with you that Stratford-upon-Avon looks interesting enough that I would want to devote more than a day to it.

I think we will need to put some thought into things we want to do - there is so much to see!!

Good morning MapLady

It looks like you have your answers now.

Thank you, Nigel - yes - we are really grateful for all the suggestions and points of view!

I wanted to come back and update on our latest plans - my husband and I did a lot more thinking, researching and talking, and decided to add Bristol to our itinerary as was suggested here. Thank you all so much for all your help - I would NEVER have figured this out on my own!!

sounds good to me

Update 2: Our travel plans have changed. Due to time constraints, we decided to keep our trip to Bristol-Dorset-London this time. We liked the idea of the Midlands so much that we have decided to plan another trip Birmingham-Shropshire-Wales in a few years. Thank you all once again for all your advice!

Not to complicate things but another area you might want to consider for a future trip is Manchester, Liverpool, Chester. A good combination of big, lively cities with plenty of industrial heritage and very good museums, plus Chester for a more traditionally beautiful small English city, all very close together. I had a very good trip there last year. Liverpool is of course known for Beatles tourism but there is much more to it than that — I spent three good days there without seeing anything Beatles except the material about them in the excellent Museum of Liverpool. Also it’s easy access from there to north Wales although I did not have time for that.

Thank you, Slate! I cannot wait to explore more of the UK!!