One of Nottingham's most recognisable landmarks is Green's Windmill which can be found in the middle of Sneinton. The windmill is so much more than just a tourist destination as it also houses the science centre, a working flour mill, and a thriving community garden for the local community.
The windmill was built in 1807 by a local baker, George Green, and was restored in the early 1980s. It is now run by the Green Windmill Trust charity who took over in 2012 with a view to keeping it open to the public and functional. These days, the windmill has a dedicated team who looks over the day-to-day running of the mill along with volunteers.
Jamie Duff is the Heritage development officer at the windmill and he has been part of the team for ten years. He feels lucky to be able to work in such a varied role.
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"When I was made redundant, I had been working in an archive so I wanted some friendly customer service skills. I looked around to see what was local to me and the windmill came up as it was going through a transitional period ten years ago from being council-run to charity-run so they were building up the volunteering," he said.
"I thought it sounded different and varied. We have the shop, activities, the mill and the DIY garden so there were a few things that attracted me as a volunteer. I've really enjoyed working here and my role has evolved a lot over the past ten years but it's something different every day. I feel very lucky and fortunate."
While today's technology has changed a lot of the activities on offer including the new science centre, there is still a traditional side to the windmill. The weather can still play a huge part in the daily tasks for the team as it can affect the amount of flour they are able to mill.
"We do supply a few bakeries but it's based on how windy it is in order to mill the flour. We can't commit to massive orders so it's a lot more home bakers or visitors who pop in. People don't realise that this is what it would have been like 200 years ago as it was very reliant on the wind. "
Jamie added: "We don't have to go to quite the same lengths now but if it was windy in the middle of the night then George Green would have been milling throughout the night to fill the flour orders for Nottingham. During the first lockdown, when everyone wanted flour, we were milling all hours."
The running of the windmill relies heavily on volunteers who want to help keep the place open. There are currently around 30 volunteers with three members of staff.
"My biggest anxieties are around staffing of volunteers and funding as we are reliant on volunteers. We have three staff but we are barely able to open with just us. The events we run such as baking, school visits, birthday parties or bigger events like the fairs bring in the money for the charity."
Hidden at the back of the windmill, there is a little community garden that provides valuable green space in an area of tight rows of houses that often don't have garden spaces. Gardeners are encouraged to grow their own vegetables there.
"It's a community garden space which is especially needed here as people only have yards or not even that. Having the accessible space is really useful and people come up from the local community to get involved with the volunteering and growing of crops. Volunteers usually get first dibs on the crops but we put some on the table for donations too," Jamie said.
Jamie has a lot of fond memories over the years of the windmill. "One bad thing that turned into a good thing was when the sails had to come off in 2016 due to rot. It was such an exciting thing and we were really busy once people realised things were working again so it was a great year for us."
The windmill has started to steady again after a slow in visitor numbers due to Covid restrictions. They are trying to get back to the numbers that they were experiencing in 2019 which was their busiest year on record in terms of volunteer and visitor numbers. Jamie would like to see a more local focus in the next few months as they work on trying to get the community to visit the windmill and not just tourists.
"We had our best year ever in 2019 as we had the most volunteers, donations and visitors along with events. We are starting to see people coming back so we are trying to expand our organisation in terms of personnel and trustees too," he said.
"We received funding to run a community engagement project. We get people visiting from halfway around the world but we don't get a lot of local Sneinton people visiting. So why not and what would interest them? Perhaps they would like to help us or volunteer as they could help shape what the future looks like for us."
