Millennium Mills
Visited with Adam X, Richie & Desolate Nation
History
Millennium Mills. Building of this iconic building started in 1905, on the Royal Victoria Docks, one of the few reminders of the industrial London that once was. It started off as a flour mill, named after it's most well known product: Millennium flour. In 1917 the mills were heavily damaged by the 'Silvertown explosion' of a nearby munitions factory. In 1920, Spillers took over and by 1927 they were starting to produce animal feed. Part of the concrete building was rebuilt in 1933, this however didn't last long as much of the site was destroyed during bombings of World War II. After the second world war, the site was rebuilt and was in full operation again by 1953. Eventually closing in the early 80's, the site is locally listed by Newham Council, I can only hope that part of this iconic building is kept as a feature in whatever redevelopment may take place.
Our Visit
I got a message from Adam X, asking if I wanted to see the sunrise from the roof of Millennium Mills. I wondered if it was meant to be a rhetorical question, of course I did!
We arranged to meet in London in the early hours of the morning. After a fail and an aborted recce, we decided to clamber in to the premises of Millennium mills. After a walk around the site and finding no obvious way in, I spotted car headlights at the main gate and somebody unlocking the chains.
A quick whistle to the 3 others and we were all hiding behind a concrete pillar each, as the car got closer and shone it's high beams we all shuffled around to avoid making a shadow and being spotted. The car drove off but we didn't know where the secca had gone, Adam X had his phone in his bag on silent and I didn't have phone numbers for the other 2. Not knowing whether it was safe to break cover I did the obvious thing and posted a FB status
I darted across and we decided to take a quick look around for secca before resuming our search for access, it wasn't long before we were in and on the roof, setting up our tripods and grabbing a few photos before sunrise. I have to say that this is possibly one of my favourite UK explores to date, and from now I'll let the photos do the talking.
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Visited with Adam X, Richie & Desolate Nation
History
Millennium Mills. Building of this iconic building started in 1905, on the Royal Victoria Docks, one of the few reminders of the industrial London that once was. It started off as a flour mill, named after it's most well known product: Millennium flour. In 1917 the mills were heavily damaged by the 'Silvertown explosion' of a nearby munitions factory. In 1920, Spillers took over and by 1927 they were starting to produce animal feed. Part of the concrete building was rebuilt in 1933, this however didn't last long as much of the site was destroyed during bombings of World War II. After the second world war, the site was rebuilt and was in full operation again by 1953. Eventually closing in the early 80's, the site is locally listed by Newham Council, I can only hope that part of this iconic building is kept as a feature in whatever redevelopment may take place.
Our Visit
I got a message from Adam X, asking if I wanted to see the sunrise from the roof of Millennium Mills. I wondered if it was meant to be a rhetorical question, of course I did!
We arranged to meet in London in the early hours of the morning. After a fail and an aborted recce, we decided to clamber in to the premises of Millennium mills. After a walk around the site and finding no obvious way in, I spotted car headlights at the main gate and somebody unlocking the chains.
A quick whistle to the 3 others and we were all hiding behind a concrete pillar each, as the car got closer and shone it's high beams we all shuffled around to avoid making a shadow and being spotted. The car drove off but we didn't know where the secca had gone, Adam X had his phone in his bag on silent and I didn't have phone numbers for the other 2. Not knowing whether it was safe to break cover I did the obvious thing and posted a FB status
I darted across and we decided to take a quick look around for secca before resuming our search for access, it wasn't long before we were in and on the roof, setting up our tripods and grabbing a few photos before sunrise. I have to say that this is possibly one of my favourite UK explores to date, and from now I'll let the photos do the talking.
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[2]
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[5]
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