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Shipton Mill
A Mill with a history; discovered by its current owners in 1981, the Cotsworld stone building looked impressive even when derelict.
A tributary of the River Avon wound round the site, but the mill race was choked and the mill wheel was all but rusted away. Breath-takingly beautiful, but still a far cry from how it would have appeared in its heyday.
The machinery to clean the corn and drive the traditional French Burr Stone Mill wheels has now been lovingly restored and where necessary modern equipment has been cunningly blended in. Stoneground flour of the highest quality is once again being milled by dedicated and highly skilled Shipton Millers as it was in Medieval times. There has been a mill here for over 900 years, as recorded in the Domesday book and even in those days much of the grain milled here would have come from the surrounding fields as it does today.
There was a time when the local mill would have been the centre of the local social life as individual farmers and villagers brought their own corn to be milled. In 1339 the miller who paid rent of a quart of a good ale and a bushel of flour would surely have approved of the mill today.
In nearby Malmesbury, site of a Benedictine monastery, the High Street is partially paved in Shipton Mill millstones, seized by the Abbot in a quarrel with the miller over who owned the mill stream fishing rights. Closer to the mill, its current layout was created during the Napoleonic wars when the miller needed more water to power the mill. He persuaded the local authorities to lend him a platoon of French Prisoners of War to divert the stream closer to the mill.
Nowadays the mill and its associated waterways are home to a thriving and diverse ecosystem from the bats in the mill eaves to the trout and crayfish in the crystal pure stream waters fed by springs. It is said that otters pass by and the striking blue flashes of the Kingfishers are an almost hourly occurrence.
At Shipton Mill we source as much as possible from local farms. We use sea borne transport for our imports - widely recognised to be the least damaging mode of distribution. We are investigating the development of a small hydro electric power unit to run off the waterwheel. We have installed a system to return excess heat from the milling process back into the offices to provide space heating in winter and hot water all the year round. Respect for the natural system and a desire to work in combination with it is the underlying philosophy of modern organic farming. More important still is the need to have a sensitive approach to life and ones own impact on the environment and immediate surroundings.
Shipton Mill actively promotes the cultivation of rare and old varieties of wheat. This is not a commercial decision as the returns are in fact far too small. It is the need to preserve and retain varieties that are not readily available and to promote the genetic and visual diversity that such crops and their sympathetic farming methods engender.
It is now recognised that growing crops of this sort in this way also has a positive effect on nutrition. Simply by being less intensively farmed, the plants have larger more robust root systems, are more drought resistant, and have greater micro nutrient and mineral content as there are less plants per square meter and therefore less competition for available resources. This is not to mention the reduced requirement for extra fertilisers and the use of weed killers etc. that are energy inefficient and environmentally damaging.
Shipton Mill wants to forge new links with the world which are inclusive of a broader range of values and relationships.
