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Blinshall Street, DUNDEE, DD1 5DF

Dundee City councils Kennels in Brown street.

Recently restored gallery at the former jute mill, now owned by the Dundee Heritage Trust.

This is now a museum of the jute industry. This is the main block of 1833 with wooden floors supported on cast iron columns and an 1852 gothic mansard cast-iron roof structure. This is the view along the top floor level, with the floors largely stripped out. This is a truly spectacular structure.

Now a museum of the jute industry. A former flax and jute spinning mill of 1833. This is the main block with the floors largely stripped out. The floors were wooden supported on iron columns and with a later 1852 gothic mansard cast-iron roof. At the bottom is the re-erected Boulton and Watt beam engine. The engine was installed at William Sandeman's Douglasfield Bleachworks in Dundee, It was ordered in 1801 and installed in 1802 at a cost of £517. The engine is believed to have worked for most of the century and was purchased and gifted to Dundee's Free Library Committee in 1898. It was displayed in a new museum at Dudhope Barracks from 1900 to 1939 when WWII intervened. The museum never reopened and the engine was dismantled in 1960s for display in Edinburgh but this too never happened and the engine returned to Dundee in 1975 and remained in store until 2012 when work started on a plan to conserve and display it at Verdant Works. This is a very late example of the type as at about the same time all iron engines with conventional cranks were starting to be built. This is the only surviving Boulton & Watt engine to have worked in Scotland and to be displayed close to where it originally worked.

Recently restored building at the former jute mill, now owned by the Dundee Heritage Trust. The chimney in the background is at Tay Works Image

Verdant works is a former flax and jute spinning mill that is now a museum of the jute industry. This little display on a floored part of the first floor shows the material (jute) in its raw state, intermediate stages (in the cans) and a finished product as twine on the trolley.

Dundee's jute museum is housed in Verdant works and in 2015 a new gallery was opened that contains this magnificent Boulton & Watt beam engine that incorporates the separate condenser, parallel motion, sun and planet gear and centrifugal governor (Watt merely borrowed the governor from mill wrighting circles where it was used in corn mills for adjusting the gap between the stones). The engine was installed at William Sandeman's Douglasfield Bleachworks in Dundee, It was ordered in 1801 and installed in 1802 at a cost of £517. The engine is believed to have worked for most of the century and was purchased and gifted to Dundee's Free Library Committee in 1898. It was displayed in a new museum at Dudhope Barracks from 1900 to 1939 when WWII intervened. The museum never reopened and the engine was dismantled in 1960s for display in Edinburgh but this too never happened and the engine returned to Dundee in 1975 and remained in store until 2012 when work started on a plan to conserve and display it at Verdant Works. This is a very late example of the type as at about the same time all iron engines with conventional cranks were starting to be built. This is the only surviving Boulton & Watt engine to have worked in Scotland and to be displayed close to where it originally worked.

Dated 1909 in the inscription on the front. The building sits on the corner of Douglas street and Brown street. The marked officers entrance was in Brown street (the shaded side in this picture).

Verdant Works is a former flax and jute spinning mill that is now a museum of the jute industry. This rather impressive cast iron flywheel is displayed in the main mill block. It c1840s/1850s and from the original steam engine used to power Park Mill, Douglas Street, Dundee. When the engine was replaced in 1921 this wheel was considered too heavy to move easily and was buried under the mill's courtyard. It was recovered by contractors during work in 2014 and brought to Verdant works for display. The smaller inner wheel is grooved for ropes to drive two floors of the mill. This is almost certainly a later addition to supplement an original gear drive (at that vintage the original drive would be by gears). Above and to the right of the wheel is a bearing box in the wall that would have been part of Verdant works original steam powered drive system.

The Ward Foundry was established in 1810 by J & C Carmichael to manufacture steam engines. This shows the c1880 new boiler shop with its riveting tower. The foundry closed in 1929 and was subsequently used by D C Thomson for paper storage. It is now in mixed occupancy and includes a mosque in its midst. This is a fascinating part of Dundee and I wish I had had more than the 2-3 hours I was allowed.