Windmills (or Wind Engines)

In 1988 my late Brother-In-Law Robert moved to Suffolk and we visited him a few times each year. There is not much steam railway engine action to photograph in Suffolk. I therefore became interested in Windmills as industrial relicts (not just for their landscape beauty). I bought an AA road atlas that actually marked on all Windmills. As we drove around we stopped at various mills for some photography. My brother lives in the Home Counties another hot bed of windmills. In fact he now lives in a village with a windmill at the end of his road, which is a fortunate co-incidence.

"Windmills" are a generic term as these are really wind engines of the pre-steam age used to mill corn, pump water or drive various other machinery. There are three main types, the POST mill, the SMOCK mill and the TOWER mill with variations in regional style and colour. Not all have 4 sails, some have 2, 6 or 8. early post mills were turned manually into the wind, but later mills turn automatically using a fantail.

I have here over 120 photos of working, preserved or ruined mills, many of which were not very well catalogued. Most are shot on Velvia slide film with a polarizing filter to get that super saturated effect. The majority are 35mm but a few are on 120 slide film. Modern HDR digital image processing has greatly improved the detail of matt black or white towers and white sails.

Some of these images are nearly 20 years old and Mills are easilly damaged in storms so they may not appear today as in these photos. Also some new restoration projects are also underway so new mills may appear.

Many thanks to everyone who has helped me identify the mills, this has saved me a great deal of detective work. I will gradually make links to further information sources and Mills restoration groups.

160 photos, 1 video | 828 views

items are from between 11 Sep 2008 & 28 Feb 2009.