Our visit to Upminster Windmill
It’s good to see how others operate and over the years FoWG volunteers have taken a trip to the other end of the Tube line to visit our counterparts at Upminster.
The last few years have been very eventful for them, having gained National Lottery and Veolia funding for major restoration work including replacement of decayed timber structural frames and cladding, reconstruction of the cap and an overhaul of some very complex machinery. The funding also provided a new visitor and education centre which includes a maintenance workshop. The Upminster volunteers have a strong background in trades and undertake significant millwrighting tasks, as unlike Lambeth, Havering does not pay directly for the ongoing maintenance.
Their windmill is much larger than Brixton’s with spacious accommodation on the ground floor with seating for around 20 people, and allows up to 35 visitors across all of the floors at any one time. This makes it easier for offering self-guided tours, facilitated by information ‘paddles’ and QR code activated videos on each floor. The restoration included the installation of a new set of stones for flour grinding (one of four sets) powered by the sails. They still need to finalise some governance and procedural aspects before embarking on flour production in earnest.
We had interesting discussions comparing experiences and exploring the possibility of collaboration and mutual support. Perhaps there could be a London-wide promotion of the four surviving windmills (Shirley, Wimbledon, Brixton and Upminster), and the idea that we could repair or construct small replacement parts at their workshop opens new possibilities.
Upminster is a smock mill built in 1803. A separate steam powered corn mill was added as early as 1811. It had a succession of many more owners than Brixton, but similar to us, it closed for commercial business in the mid 1930’s, was saved from demolition by public campaigning around the war years, and listed Grade II* in the early 1950’s. The mill was opened to the public in 1965 with a pause between 2015 and 2023 for the restoration. Find out more about Upminster Windmill here.
