Charlie Taylor from BBC Radio Somerset visits the Mill: How the River Axe is Critical in Making our Paper

 Last month, Charlie Taylor who hosts the evening show on BBC Radio Somerset, came to visit St Cuthberts Mill as part of his feature on the River Axe. He wanted to find out exactly why the river was so important to us, and how exactly it helps us to make paper. Although Charlie’s hometown is the City of Wells, he wasn’t aware how important the river and its location to St Cuthberts Mill was. Cathy Frood from our marketing team took the opportunity to show Charlie around everything that St Cuthberts Mill had to offer.  

Follow this link to find the interview in full: 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0b3209l 

You may notice that in some of the pictures, Cathy looks tiny in comparison to Charlie. The truth of the matter is that Charlie really is that tall and Cathy really is that small!  

When Charlie arrived, we had a beautiful start to the interview. Although too quick to catch it on camera, we were gifted with a real-life Kingfisher flying downstream. This got us onto talking about the importance of wildlife at the mill. The river was full to the brim, as we had a lot of rain from the weekend before. Normally we could see trout in the river, but unfortunately because of the increased flow of water, there were none to be seen. Cathy explained to Charlie that seeing trout in the river was a great sign of healthy water, and the word Axe actually means an abundance of fish.  

Asking why the river was so important to us here at the mill, Cathy replied that water really was the lifeblood of the paper mill. The River Axe rises at Wookey Hole Caves, just up the road from us. As the surrounding Mendip Hills are made out of limestone, the water filtered through them is known to be extraordinarily pure, which is why it attracts so much wildlife. The pure water is a key ingredient in making our paper, as we need it to make the greatest quality artist’s papers as possible.  

Charlie was shown the three large tanks, tucked around the side of the mill. These are the sand filters, which filter the already pure water. These filters have layers of sand in them that push the water through and take out any particles of debris. These create some wonderful dripping water sounds that were used on the radio piece. 

The size of the buildings impressed Charlie who was blown away as we moved around and through the building. He made the comparison of Wells being such a small city and having a huge cathedral, and that St Cuthberts Mill was similar and a “cathedral to papermaking”. He pointed out that it was unbelievable that we called the part of the mill that was built in 1897, ‘the new bit’, which led us onto the history of the mill itself.  

We are the last commercial paper mill along the river, explained Cathy. Although there used to be six, due to the purity of the water, which led this area of Somerset being proficient in  papermaking. St Cuthberts Mill have also been making paper since the 1700’s meaning we’ve learnt a few things about making paper along the way.

During the Victorian period, the owner of the mill put on a beautiful frontage that can still be seen today. 

 Moving inside the mill, Cathy demonstrated to Charlie just how the beginning of the paper
making process uses the water filtered through the river and one key other ingredient- pulp. Our pulp is either made from wood, coming from sustainably managed forests in Scandanavia, or cotton, a by-product of the textile industry, coming from Spain or China. The pulp is mixed into a huge vat called the hydro-pulper. At this stage in the process it is about 97% water and 3% pulp. Charlie commented that it looked just like ‘papery porridge’ and we had to agree with him. 

The rest of the tour involved taking Charlie around the seemingly endless site, showing him exactly where the water is used in each part of the process. We also demonstrated how we filter the water again after it’s been used, to go back into the river and maintain the beautiful level of wildlife, as discussed earlier. It was great to show an outsider of the mill exactly what it is that makes this place so very special, as it gave a whole new perspective on the importance of water in the Mill. 

We would like to thank Charlie for coming out to the Mill and we hope he comes to visit again soon. 

Which part of the process would you like to hear more about? Please let us know in the comments below.