Power of persuasion

Mo MacLeod describes it as “a singular act of lunacy”. But it was the start of a project which she and husband Dave Mann have been involved in for the past seven years.

The couple and their two young children had been living in Norway where Dave was working as a seismologist when, in 2004, he was made redundant, so they decided to move back to Yorkshire.

Dave was duly dispatched to find the family somewhere to live and sometime later Mo received a phone call back in Norway. “He said to me ‘Well, I haven’t found us a house, but I think I may have found us a project.’”

While exploring the area between York and Malton, near the tiny village of Howsham, Dave had stumbled across Howsham Mill, a derelict corn mill in the middle of a small tree-covered island in the river Derwent.

The couple quickly decided they would buy it and restore it to its former glory. “It was completely overgrown,” says Mo. “We could hardly see it but we fell in love with it. It was just so quirky: this huge ornate building in the middle of nowhere – apart from anything else, we wanted to find out more about it; it was a bit of a detective story.”

The history of the mill dates back to around 1775 and it was designed by architect John Carr, better known for Fairfax House in York and the extension to the stables at Castle Howard.

A functioning corn mill until 1947, it fell into disrepair after the estate of nearby Howsham Hall was split up in the 1950s to pay off death duties and the island, with the mill on it, was sold for fishing rights.

In 1965 the then owners applied to have the mill pulled down but, luckily, it was listed by the HBMC (Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission, which became English Heritage) as it was “a rare example of Gothic Revival style as applied to a functional building”.

Its dual purpose as a working mill and a rather grand garden folly for Howsham Hall makes it one of only two such buildings in the UK – the other is on the Chatsworth estate in Derbyshire.

“John Carr wasn’t one to waste money,” says Mo. “So he only decorated on three sides of the building – the ones that were visible from the hall. There is also a rather wonderful painted gothic ‘window’.”

Having bought the mill in 2004, Mo and Dave set up a charity – the Renewable Heritage Trust – in order to get funding for the restoration project and signed the building over to the trust.

They had briefly contemplated living in the mill but thought again when they discovered that the building was the subject of various conservation orders well as standing in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and being a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI).

“Looking back we had an absolutely breathtaking lack of knowledge,” says Mo. “But that was a good thing, I think, because it meant that we were very careful to talk to everybody. It’s been a masterclass in the ‘what if’; it’s also been about perseverance and not walking away. When people have said no to a suggestion, then we have said ‘ok, well, what if...’”

Mo and Dave arranged for a feasibility study to be carried out to find a use for the building that wouldn’t encroach on the environment: there is a colony of breeding otters and 86 varieties of wildflower on the island, and they have deliberately left the mill as a peaceful place to be discovered.

There is no vehicle access and it’s a quarter of a mile walk from the road across a field then through unspoilt woodland to get to it. “The mill was derelict for 60 years and had a bit of a reputation as a place to have a party for local teenagers,” says Mo. “Some of the people who have helped out here have said ‘to my shame, I’m one of those who may have contributed to the mill being so run down and I’d like to put something back’.”

Mo is a larger-than-life, energetic personality whose enthusiasm for the project is inspiring and infectious. “To start with I was slightly apologetic when asking for help or money,” she says, “but these days I’m so cheeky!” Over the years since the couple bought the mill, she has persuaded hundreds of people to participate in the mill’s regeneration through freely-given time and expertise.

“We couldn’t have done any of this without all those people,” she says.

In 2006 the mill was one of the participants in the BBC’s Restoration Village series, hosted by Griff Rhys Jones. The project made it to the finals and was the regional winner for the North of England for which they were awarded £50,000.

“We had a great time while they were filming here. Griff Rhys Jones was fantastic – he really got involved; he was in the mill-race with everyone else helping to dig out the mud.”

Since then the project has moved on apace and various developments have taken place, the most significant of which is the reinstatement of the waterwheel which is harnessing the power of the river water to generate electricity.

“Dave has always been interested in hydropower,” says Mo. “It is something we have talked about since we were teenagers, having a mill and generating electricity from it. There is just so much water flowing through here but there are also a lot of protected fish in the river, so we had to think of an answer.”

Eventually they found a company in Germany that manufactures fish-friendly Archimedean Screw turbines and the Environment Agency, after conducting their own monitoring, approved the idea.

“We produce electricity that goes into the National Grid and have signed up with a green electricity company that buys our renewable energy,” says Mo. “We have told people who we are selling to and they can contact that company and sign up with them – we now produce enough electricity to run the whole village.”

Using Archimedean Screws has opened up all sorts of possibilities for small-scale hydropower schemes using old mills and weirs and Mo and Dave are now at the forefront of supplying the equipment to harness water power for projects all over the UK including several in Yorkshire such as Lowna Mill in Kirkbymoorside, Bridge End Mill in Settle and most recently at Newby Hall.

In May this year, Howsham Mill hosted the first ever hydro-powered outdoor film screening in association with Screenwaves, a pilot scheme bringing cinema to rural areas funded by Screen Yorkshire and North Yorkshire Digital Cinema.

“We were in the part of the mill that has no roof so we had the screen in front of us and the stars above our heads. It was quite magical,” says Mo.

The long-term plan for the mill is that it will become an educational resource and community centre focusing on local heritage, renewable energy and a more sustainable way of life. There have been suggestions to run photography and art classes at the mill, and even using it as a wedding venue. The aim is to make the building totally self-sustaining with all the money earned from the hydropower sales being used to fund the restoration.

The Trust has recently put in an application to the Heritage Lottery Fund. If they get it, some of the funding will be used to employ a part-time education and events officer. “It has such potential for learning – about wildlife, history, renewable energy, countryside studies.

“In the 18th century there were thousands of barges a week passing through this part of the river, so the mill is very much part of our industrial heritage.”

Having already rebuilt the granary, which was the least architecturally sensitive part of the mill, the next stage will involve huge structural adjustments and the restoration of decorative stonework.

“The whole point of this project is to try and put the mill back to how it was,” says Mo. “So we are using traditional methods and materials right down to the fact that everything is delivered by barge, which is lovely because there is a nice historical synergy to it.”

Mo has a can-do attitude and an inspirational degree of commitment to the project, but she admits to experiencing every six months or so a ‘what possessed us to do this?’ moment.

“But then I only have to come down here and look around and I know why,” she says. “It’s a magical place.”

Visitors are welcome at any time, but the first Sunday of every month open day at the mill from 10am-4pm. The mill is taking part in the annual national Heritage Open Days (September 8-11). Information visit www.howshammill.org.uk