Completed Projects | Medieval Hall | Withey's Yard | Cainscross Toll House | Arundel Mill House | Anti-Slavery Arch | Brunel Goods Shed Phase 1 | Brunel Goods Shed Phase 2 | HLF Community Action | SWAPT Heritage Fair | Plaques
Arundel Mill House and Cottages were in a ruinous state when Stroud Preservation Trust bought them in February 1990. Cracks in the walls visibly widened during the months when the Trust was negotiating to buy. Once the sale of the property was completed, emergency work began the same day to prop up the Mill House. This was a large, complex and expensive project which took three years to complete. The one acre property included the Mill House, an adjoining workshop and two semi-detached cottages. There is thought to have been a mill on this site as early as the 14th century, but the first documentary evidence dates from 1585, when two fulling mills and a corn mill were granted to local landowner Richard Arundell. During the 17th century the complex included four mills and a dye house, and from 1837 until the early 1930s it specialised in dyeing. The house was requisitioned by the RAF during the Second World War, and the mills were demolished shortly thereafter. Working once more with Feilden Clegg Design, the Trust's scheme provided three houses in the Mill House, two dwellings in the former workshop and renovated the cottages so providing a total of seven homes on the site with private and communal gardens. In an innovative collaboration, Stroud Valleys Project rebuilt the broken weir and restored the large mill pond and they continue to manage this part of the site. |