It is July 1872, and in the ‘Five Towns’ of the Staffordshire Potteries, Edwin Clayhanger is attending school for the last time. Although his youthful ambition is to become an architect, expectation weighs heavily upon his shoulders; it is anticipated that Edwin will join the family’s printing business, lovingly built up from scratch by his father, Darius. Edwin, however, is dreaming of a very different kind of future: his youthful ambition is to become an architect.