Norwegian Sawmill Museum

Norway’s success story begins with timber. For a time it was the country’s most important export product and was later used as a building material for factories and towns, thereby giving  a boost to the country's industrialisation and modernisation. The sawmill constructed at Spillum in central Norway in 1884 was at the forefront of this development. Its pioneering steam-driven engines were the first to be used in the timber processing industry. Today, the building houses the Norwegian Sawmill Museum. Here visitors can experience industrial history live – on running saws and planing machines! They can also see how beams, shutter boards, moulding and panelling are made from unworked tree trunks. The whole site has been remained unchanged. It includes the largest timber building (covering an area of almost 3000 m²) and one of the largest steam engines in the country. Archaeologists, historians, restoration workers and engineers have turned the industrial monument into a lively venue. At the same time they have been able to preserve the working skills that were necessary to run the mill successfully in early industrial times, despite all attempts at mechanisation. Two old tugs, Hauka and Oter, lie tied up at the banks of the directly adjacent fjord. They also belong to the museum.