Our small band of volunteers at the mill have been working hard bringing some of the Victorian woodworking machinery back to life and demonstrating it to curious visitors on our regular Thursday open days. Up till now, they’ve been using offcuts of scrap wood but they’ve just taken on their first little community project so the machinery will be being used on “real” wood.
In the village of Thwaite in Swaledale there are two hardwood memorial benches which were donated to the village some years ago. They have been a welcome perch for foot weary walkers and many a passenger waiting for the Little White Bus which travels around the Dales but are now in need of some tender care themselves. With the permission of the donor families, the benches have been brought to the mill and are now awaiting repair. They’ve been washed and measured and we’ll be using the Victorian machinery to make new planks and whatever other parts are needed to restore the benches to their former glory.
Regular updates can be found on the group’s facebook page https://www.facebook.com/GayleMill1784
We’ll post pictures here of the benches once the renovation is complete.
Open Thursdays Between 10 and 4
Gayle Mill DL8 3RZ What3words: opts.sending.belief