The last of its kind, this is a must see Nundle treasure
Owners Nick & Kylie Bradford have found their place in the world and are keen to ensure that Australia never forgets its woolly history. Chatting to Nick he gives us some background about the Woollen Mill and how it all came to be for them in Nundle.
Do both yourself and Kylie work at the Wool Mill?
Yes we both work there, it’s our full-time jobs now. We bought it about 10 years ago but lived in Sydney for the first 6 and a half years. Which didn't work out so well, it was really hard to run the business from Sydney and it suffered because of it. Since moving here and spending all our time and energy on the business it has really turned a corner. It’s funny how giving the business just that little bit of love could change things so much.
Where does the majority of the wool you produce go to?
It goes to both Australia and overseas but predominately Australia and New Zealand, but we’ve always got yarn going somewhere around the world. It’s the last working woollen Mill of its kind in Australia so people like that about it. It’s very well known now and people travel from all over to come and visit.
Is the machinery in the Mill all original?
We’re constantly sourcing new machines all the time, we recently bought a ball winder which was manufactured in the 1940’s, but because people know about us they’ll come to us and say I’ve got XYZ. When we took over in 2007 most of the machines were here, we’ve just added to it and continuley maintain the machines to keep them all working.
It's funny, I started out in the textiles world some 30 years ago, I graduated from a Melbourne textiles course and even though the textiles world has been very kind to me and we've done some amazing things I can honestly say it's only now that I am really enjoying what I do.
I've found something that I am passionate about, I am not trying to make loads of money just trying to do something that I love. I think our staff actually get paid more than what we do. It's just all about finding your niche and being passionate about it.
