Watermill, mill barn and cultural center.
The undershot water mill is located in the district of Sudweyhe, in the street "Im Mühlengrunde". Together with a half-timbered barn, the restored monument on the Niedersächsische Mühlenstraße forms the "Mühlenhof Sudweyhe". The municipality of Weyhe set up a cultural center here in 1982-84, which it still runs today. The ensemble is surrounded by the "Ellernbruch" wood and the former mill garden, which attracts numerous visitors with open-air concerts in the summer months. For over 10 years, sculptors have been meeting for a symposium in the outdoor area and creating sculptures and objects.
The mill barn, built at the beginning of the 19th century, offers space for cabaret events and film screenings. It is also a popular meeting place for clubs and interest groups. The mill building houses the picture archive of the Weyher municipal archive and a small museum that offers insights into the preserved mill technology. Art exhibitions with artists from the region are regularly held on the upper floor.
Around 1260, "the mill" in Weyhe belonged to the feudal estate of Henry the Archer, a Count of Oldenburg-Wildeshausen. It was probably a predecessor of today's watermill, which was under the feudal lordship of the Archbishop of Bremen as early as the 1420s and as late as the 17th century. The corn mill, which was shut down in 1963 and acquired by the municipality of Weyhe in 1981, was part of the neighboring estate. The current building was constructed in four phases: around 1819 (south-western wing with mansard/crippled hipped roof), around 1853 (eastern half-timbered extension), 1869-70 (water wall) and 1907 (redstone extension).
The Sudweyher watermill was operated by servants of the lords of the manor or by temporary tenants. A Merian engraving published in 1653 provides the oldest pictorial representation of the mill and shows that the half-timbered building had three water wheels at the time. Extensive modernization measures in 1869/70 resulted in a reduction to two larger water wheels, each of which drove two grinding gears.
In 1907, a 20 hp suction gas engine from the gas engine factory in Cologne-Ehrenfeld was installed in the redstone extension built at the time. The background for the modernization measure was the pig fattening boom in and around Weyhe, which led to the establishment of several motor mills. The natural power-independent grinding operations formed strong competition and forced the estate mill tenant to take action. The suction gas engine purchased at the time was replaced by a 28 hp electric motor around 1930.
The mill produced cattle feed meal as well as baking meal and fine flour until its closure. In the 17th century, an oil mill was also installed for a time alongside the grain mills. After Weipart Ludwig von Fabrice, Vice-Chancellor of Duke Georg Wilhelm of Celle, acquired the estate and the mill in 1696, he had a fulling mill installed separately from the grinding gears. The fulling of woolen fabrics, which were primarily produced by Bremen cloth makers, remained an episode limited to a few decades.
For the production of fine flour from wheat and rye, three roller mills were used in the 1950s and 60s, coupled with a wind sweeper, grain cleaning and plansifter. With a sufficient amount of water, 1.5 tons of grain could be processed into fine flour every day. Today, the mill has an undershot steel water wheel - with a diameter of 4.65 m.
Mill barn: The outbuilding of the watermill, often referred to as the "bakehouse", was built around 1807. It served as a barn and cattle shed, during the Second World War as a forced labor camp, and after 1945 as a bakery and rented apartment. Its predecessor was probably a fulling house built in 1702, where the fuller lived until the 1730s. Cloth was also stored there temporarily, which had been or was to be processed in the whistling mill that existed for a short time. Around 1738, it is said that the estate gardener used the living quarters as accommodation.
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