What's going on at Town Mill?
Well, the simple answer is, as a heritage jewel and a community hub there's always something going at the Town Mill.
Follow our TOWN MILL DIARIES to find out the huge variety of activities that are keeping us busy here. Let's share with you what has been going on this summer.
MILLFEST 2025
Summer at TOWN MILL started in style when we celebrated MILLFEST - a festival of the rich artisan and craft heritage which is an enduring story in this very special nook of Lyme Regis. With Town Mill boasting a thousand years of history, you can feel its heritage and traditions in the very fabric of the place and these were brought to life with artisans-galore - and a splash of good drink, good food and good music!
This 3-day free-to-visit event offered visitors and the whole community the opportunity to meet the people still contributing to Lyme's deep artisan heritage - whether that be the millers producing the finest, small batch nutrient rich flours milled right here or learning about the alchemy behind the micro brewery's LYME GOLD with pop-up sessions from Lyme Regis Brewery's head brewer.
In the mill, visitors were able to have a go at milling their own mini bag of stoneground flour with a new hand powered grain mill as well as sampling delicious produce made with Town Mill flours.
We welcomed the world renown BOAT BUILDING ACADEMY to the gallery with an exhibition of fine craftsmanship on display in their boats, paddle and surf boards and exquisite furniture, and SOMERSET WOOLSHED spinning beautiful yarns from local fleeces. Other artisans deftly demonstrated their skills, with visitors observing pottery throwing, jewellery making and the arts of seaweed identification and pressing - a wonderful weekend with something for everybody!
"WHERE THERE'S A MILL....THERE'S A WAY" : RE-JUVENATED MILL MODEL REVEALED
Just in the nick of time for MILLFEST, we received back on site our fabulous scale model of the Town Mill, which has been spectacularly refurbished by Bristol-based production design house, OBJECT SOUP. The 1/10th scale model has been in the mill since 2007 and was built by volunteer Miller, Jim Macallister. A key educational resource in the mill ever since, Jim's model helped the Millers to explain simply to visitors the interaction between the three mill floors and how the mill’s cogs and structures work as a whole to produce our flour. But the model had seen better days. In autumn 2024, the model was collected by female-led production house OBJECT SOUP who specialise in scale models and dioramas and whisked away to Bristol for months of painstaking work. Leading this talented team, Helena Black returned Jim’s model back to Lyme Regis on Friday, May 23 and with such a glorious transformation complete - the model now featuring a working water wheel, cogs, gears and millstones all beautifully illuminated - we decided to showcase it in the Malthouse Gallery for the three days of Millfest Millfest was launched with the grand unveiling of the completely re-furbished model by Guest of Honour, Steve Macallister, son of Jim Macallister to an audience of mill alumni, volunteers and model enthusiasts - a wonderful gathering with the love of the mill as a common thread amongst all. Using money raised by National Lottery players, The National Lottery Heritage Fund supports projects that connect people and communities with the UK's Heritage. Our ability to forge ahead with the model refurbishment project which is a critical but delicate educational asset for the story-telling that takes place everyday in our historic mill will allow us to continue to share our site heritage in an engaging and easy to understand way with our community and many visitors. As well as expressing our appreciation to all our funders, thanks to National Lottery players, we have been able to move forward with this vitally important project within the Trust’s overall vision to secure the future of the mill and embed its legacy as a vibrant community asset in the very heart of Lyme Regis.
A Visit with Deep Roots
At the start of June we were thrilled to receive a visit from John Fowler & his wife. John is the grandson of Oswald Fowler, the last miller at Town Mill
John's father Bob, is the toddler in this black and white photo from the mill's archive and in the book ELECTRIC LYME, pictured with his mother and father, Oswald
Remarkably, John still carries the same photo in his own wallet - a powerful reminder of his family's deep connection to the mill and seeing past and present come together made for a truly special visit.
THE BRIDPORT BADMINSTON CLUB TELL US "USE IT OR LOSE IT!"
We had a busy summer welcoming lots of groups and organisations to help more people enjoy and benefit from this special heritage site.
We kicked off the summer by welcoming the BRIDPORT BADMINTON CLUB and their mantra of "use it - or lose it" resonated strongly with us, because like any good piece of machinery, the mill works best when it's used regularly too!
Like all first time visitors, they were captivated by the mill's scale - yet its simplicity - and how natural energy from the river is used to harness momentum. Use it....or lose it!
1st CHARMOUTH CUBS WORKING TOWARDS THEIR ENVIRONMENTAL CONSERVATION BADGE VISIT THE MILL
We had a great time working with the 1st Charmouth Cubs to achieve their Environmental Conservation Badge by looking a sources of renewable energy with them.
During the visit, the group saw just how water from the river is used to turn the waterwheel and how this drives the cogs and gears to turn the millstones and produce our wholesome flour.
Akela Mel Dawes told us "the cubs enjoyed a very informative tour of Town Mill and were able to participate in trying different milling methods and ask lots of questions. We were even treated to a bag of flour which we plan to use to make bread sticks at our forthcoming camp!"
SPECIAL DELIVERY
A great privilege to mill-to-order a batch of wholemeal heritage wheat flour for the new owners of the fine-dining restaurant, MILLSIDE with whom we share our Mill Lane location.
Paul - one of our team of very skilled millers - invested time, care and attention to every aspect of the stoneground milling process to ensure the highest quality flour for the restaurant. From grain, to flour, to restaurant in 2 hours!
If you choose the Sourdough Foccacia at the Millside, you'll be enjoying a wonderful Lyme food experience - with a little Town Mill history thrown in for good measure!
KNOCK ON WOOD!
It was a great pleasure to work with YVONNE BRUTON this summer, artistic soul and advocate for dynamic local charities AXMINSTER & LYME CANCER SUPPORT and WELDMAR HOSPICECARE. ALCS offer a wonderful range of services via a local support network and provide everything from creative activities to holistic therapies as well as relevant diet and lifestyle information for anyone affected by any cancer. The wonderful Dorset-based Weldmar Hospice provide specialist end of life care for adults with a life limiting illness, and support for their loved ones. A series of workshops were undertaken at the mill where attendees created their own tote bag or tea towel with ancient woodblock printing methods. By giving space at Town Mill over for free, the workshops were able to offer some subsidised places for those effected by cancer to attend - and we were very touched to hear people’s stories about how cancer had effected their lives. The need for respite, change of scenery, purpose and creativity are all so important in the management of this disease so these fun, productive experiences were a tonic for managing some of life's challenges - and a pleasure for us to be involved with.
A wonderful July afternoon at the mill where we welcomed the Mayor & Mayoress of Lyme Regis to officially open a new staircase providing a new way to access the Mill, from The Lynch into the Mill's glorious MILLER'S GARDEN
These artistically-inspired wheatsheaf stairs and gates have been created by super-talented Alistair McGoldrick of Arc Edge Metal Work & are part of a suite of work around Town Mill designed to both elevate it - and make it fit for the future.
It has been possible to complete these projects because of the generous support of the National Lottery Heritage Fund and other supporters who have recognised the significance of this free-entry heritage site which connects the local community and visitors with over 700 years of stone-ground milling.
*WHAT DOES TOWN MILL MEAN TO YOU?*
In July we were delighted to complete a project we had been working on in collaboration with THE WOODROFFE SCHOOL to produce a range of student-designed artistic festival flags to be displayed at the mill. With a brief of “What does Town Mill mean to you?” the DESIGN & TECHNOLOGY lunchtime club led by passionate teacher Sara Vincent completely embraced this textile-focused project with the students producing 10 wonderful images, all with very different interpretations of the mill and which as a body of work, captured the geographic, historic, artisan, commercial and social aspects of the Town Mil site.
The flags have done a fantastic job of explaining visually that Town Mill really does have something for everyone - and have been brilliantly effective at not only bringing a festival-feel to the Miller’s Garden this summer, but also creating intrigue, with visitors pausing longer in the garden to look at the flags’ finer details, almost working as “leaflets” for explaining all there is on site! It was wonderful to welcome Mrs Vincent to the mill with three of the participating students for a flag planting ceremony and to thank the students for all their hard work - everyone has been thrilled to see their paper representations come to life in flag-form!
SUMMER NIGHTS - GOOD FOOD - GOOD MOOD!
At the height of summer we celebrated SUMMER NIGHTS - our annual free event where visitors can visit the mill late into the evening and explore all it has to offer!
With people exploring the mill, tasting produce made with our flours, dancing in the courtyard and enjoying a wonderful open-air paella, it was the kind of night that a summer in Lyme is made for!
Thank you to everyone that joined us - these evenings help us reach out to a whole new range of mill visitors who might not previously have felt connected to the mill's heritage.
CARNIVAL COMES TO LYME REGIS
We enjoyed a wonderful summer evening representing Town Mill at the carnival organised by LYME REGIS REGATTA & CARNIVAL - a much-loved annual event raising funds for local good causes which we joined for the first time in 2024!
We were delighted by a strong turn out by our volunteers, proudly carrying our banner proclaiming "We've all been through the mill - and you can go through it too!" alongside a playful nod to the Mill's reality as an ancient watermill : "Part powered by water - mostly powered by volunteers."
It was a wonderful opportunity to celebrate both the Mill's heritage and the dedicated volunteer community that keeps it open and thriving - they certainly embraced the carnival atmosphere!
MINI MILLERS TAKE THE BISCUIT
We've always found that some visitors can be hesitant to step across the threshold of the mill often wondering what's inside - but when they do, they're always impressed! So as part of our desire to really engage visitors of all ages and backgrounds, we've been coming up with some innovative ways of helping people get "hands-on" and so this summer, we introduced a new MINI MILLER EXPERIENCE, which enabled children to use a suite of hand-operated, table-top grain mills that mirror the process in the main mill, with grain still fed into a hopper and ground between a bed stone and a rotating top stone to produce flour! The fantastic mini millers that have come along to experience milling for themselves, start by spending a little bit of time in the mill itself, watching our powerful waterwheel start-up and the millstones in action - seeing this process helped the mini millers understand exactly what they were going to achieve when they had a go at mini-milling themselves. The mini millers finished off by batch-tracking their flour and putting together their own biscuit kits with recipe and biscuit cutter to make some marvellous Town Mill biscuits when they got home.
Remember what we say - "Where there's a mill.....there's a way".
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Credits:
Created with an image by Nitr - "wheat ears and grains"