Sarehole Mill Museum

JRR Tolkien grew up across the road from Sarehole Mill and in later life, he would draw on its rural surroundings to create Middle-earth. There are also connections with another Birmingham son. Matthew Boulton, manufacturer and business partner of engineer James Watt, leased the building between 1756 and 1761 and used it as a ‘flatting mill’ to produce sheet metal to make buttons.