High Mill, Camperdown Works, Methven Street, Dundee

High Mill, Camperdown Works, Methven Street, Dundee

High Mill is a monumental jute mill designed by G A Cox, apparently with assistance from Peter Carmichael and millwright work by J and C Carmichael. The building was constructed in three stages beginning in 1857 and completed in 1868.

The mill is 500 feet long with a 100-foot-high clock and bell-tower at its north-east end. It comprises three storeys with basement and attic, plus a two-storey rear section. The structure is a 40-bay fireproof mill constructed in coursed rubble with ashlar dressings.

The north elevation features three storeys, an attic storey, and a sunken basement behind cast-iron railings. Two five-bay advanced pedimented sections occupy the ninth to thirteenth bays from each end, containing ground floor doors and one keystoned round-headed window set within an oriel. Each pediment has a ball finial in its tympanum.

The west elevation comprises a four-storey gable with attic occupying four bays, with two windows in a mansard attic topped by a flat-topped finial and skewputts. A small corniced ashlar block appears at the base, adjacent to a five-bay two-storey section to the south with main cornice.

The south elevation consists of two storeys across the full 40-bay span, with occasional ground floor doors, main cornice, and parapet. The multi-storey section to the north has a similar south elevation with two upper floors arranged across 40 bays. Three larger windows light the engine houses.

The east elevation has a two-storey five-bay section with cornice, and a three-storey attic four-bay section with five round-headed windows at ground floor. An elaborately scrolled gable with ball finial crowns this elevation. A square-section clock-tower rises from an advanced rectangular north-east stair tower with channelled ashlar at ground floor and channelled quoins at first and second floors featuring windows set in architraves. Third floor windows are round-headed and sit between pilasters. The tower has a dentil cornice with pediments to north and south and balustrades to east and west elevations.

The tall square-section clock stage is constructed in ashlar with large clock faces on each elevation over bipartites, topped by a consoled cornice. A very large octagonal cast-iron bellcote with ogee roof and ball finial crowns the tower.

Original windows are six-pane top hoppers except at ground floor of the south elevation, which are four-pane sash and case. The roof is mansard slate with full-length skylights. Ornate wrought-iron street lamps are present.

The interior is fireproof throughout. Very long rows of cast-iron columns carry cast-iron beams, brick arches, and wrought-iron ties. The south wall of the multi-storey mill is carried at ground floor on a stone wall with openings in the 1857 west section. The central and east sections are carried on a colonnade of Tuscan columns. A stone dividing wall separates the early 1860s mill from the 1867-68 east section.

The ground floor to the south, or first floor of the two-storey section, comprises four long aisles covered by superb gothic cast-iron roofs carried on three rows of cast-iron columns. The attic of the multi-storey block features a fine gothic cast-iron roof carried on two rows of clustered columns. The west pediment has a wooden roof while the east pediment is cast-iron. The main stairs in the west pediment display unusual open cast-iron construction on cast-iron columns, while stone spiral stairs occupy the north-east tower.

Four engine houses occupy the ground floor. Three are grouped behind the west pediment with large windows to the south at first floor. From west to east these comprise: a small engine house with cast-iron or steel ceiling fixtures; a very large engine house rising from basement to first floor, projecting to the south with large wooden mullioned windows, later converted to a generator house; a medium-sized engine house with two fluted cast-iron columns carrying arched support for a 100-horsepower beam engine by J and C Carmichael, with other cast-iron ceiling fittings and a hole for the beam floored over, set on a masonry base; and a horizontal engine house at the east end of the mill, single-storey with two large battered and coved masonry blocks. This final engine house is roofed with a wooden king post roof on carved gothic brackets and features a louvred ridge skylight.