This window at Winchester City Mill might just be my favourite window of all time
Sometimes the real picture is behind you
I don’t know if that is an actual quote but sometimes I feel it should be. We always focus on looking forwards, or staring at what we think we should be looking at, that we miss something else entirely. Something that actually be more of a story.
I found myself doing just that on Saturday. We were heading to Gunwharf Quays for the day to look for various birthday presents as there are three in the family this week. Ten minutes down the M3 and Mr B said “shall we do Winchester instead?”. I have never been so that was a yes.
We wandered, we stopped for lunch. We bought a sign. We bought “things” and on wandering back to the car we saw the Winchester City Mill, a National Trust property that sits on the River Itchen. As both of us had our membership cards with us it seemed rude not to pop in for ten minutes.
There has been a working water mill on the site for a thousand years and it could quite possibly be the oldest working mill in England. So we wandered down the stairs to take a closer look. I had brought my camera with me for the day and as Mr B asked if he could use it to play around with taking some photos of moving water I was drawn to the window above and snapped some pics using my phone. As you know now I have a thing about windows and as I looked at it I was captivated. Yes the noise of the water mill was incredible but rather than standing to look at it I turned my back on it and stared out of the window. It is pictures like this that made me want to start a weekly feature about windows.
Naturally framing the shot behind. A bridge, sunshine, a river. It couldn’t be more perfect and I wondered how many people who were drawn downstairs to see the mill had never registered that little window. Mesmerised by the noise of the river flowing through the mill, powering it round.
Back upstairs and you can have a chat to the miller bagging up the flour
And having watched flour being made it seemed rude to not buy some and then come home and bake. This being #RealBreadWeek and all
- 500g of stoneground flour
- 250g of strong white bread flour
- 1tsp of yeast
- 1tsp of sugar
- 1tsp of salt
- Add all the ingredients to your bread maker and turn it on, using the wholewheat setting.
- Let the machine do its thing for around 3.5 hours
And I leave you with three other favourite pics from the afternoon, a view through an archway into a mews, a run of stunning iron railings and some blossom growing on a tree near our car park. How blue is this sky?!
Window Wednesday is my weekly look at or through a window