The Fulling Mill across the River Alre dates
from the 13th century. It is now a private house
and it was saved from dereliction in 1951 when it
was renovated and the now beautiful garden laid
out. It
had become derelict having fallen into
disuse in the 19th century when the cloth industry
established large mills to undertake an
increasingly mechanised process taking all of the
business from established local mills.
The fulling of cloth is a process to tighten
and shrink the cloth into a closely woven product.
In early times the pressing and kneading was done
by human feet, in shallow streams, using fullers
earth. By medieval times water power was being
used to drive hammers to do the work once done by
human feet. The water mills constructed for this
purposes were known as fulling mills and for
centuries the surrounding area resounded to the
hammering of the fulling stocks as they prepared
the cloth.