Brierley Hill is a small town and electoral ward of the Dudley Metropolitan Borough, in the West Midlands of England, and is situated approximately 2.5 miles south of central Dudley and 2 miles north of Stourbridge. Part of the Black Country, and in a heavily industrialised area of the Dudley Borough, it has a population of 13,935 at the 2011 census, and is best known for glass and steel manufacturing, although the industry has declined considerably since the 1970s. One of the largest factories in the area was the Round Oak Steelworks, which was closed down and redeveloped in the 1980s to become the Merry Hill Shopping Centre. Brierley Hill was originally in Staffordshire, but is now part of the West Midlands metropolitan county since its creation in 1974.