The Industrial Revolution in Wales was based on raw materials rather than manufactured goods. The first area of industrial growth was the north-east, near industrial Lancashire and the ports of the Dee Estuary. The area was the first to be linked to the system of turnpike roads, making it possible to transport Welsh coal and iron to fuel the English Industrial Revolution. Welsh ironworks were among the first to use the steam engine. Bersham ironworks made most of the cylinders used in Watt’s steam engines.

Welsh ironmasters employed innovations like Cort’s revolutionary puddling method (1784), which speeded up the process of turning pig iron into wrought iron. Mines were opened from Prestatyn to Llanarmon and smelters were built to process zinc and silver, the by-products of lead mining. In 1768, rich copper deposits were found at Mynydd Parys near Amlwch in Anglesey, and an advanced copper making industry developed in the north-west.

Metalworking depended on coal. Flintshire was one of the few regions with coal as well as ores. The biggest coal deposits were in the mountainous South. It was not until 1800 that a canal system was built which linked this area to the ports, opening up the great South Wales coalfields.