Sugar Mill

The Sugar Mill is located at the Oderbruch which is the most remote and less populated area in the East of Germany very closed to the polish border. In the 18th century Frederick the Great (1712-1786) drained the Oderbruch and recruited new settlers from outside Prussia with numerous privileges offered. The Sugar Mill was built and founded in 1863 by J. C. Freund & Co. and started to produce cane sugar in the very same year. After the second World War it became a nationally-owned enterprise under the name of VEB Zuckerfabrik Voßberg. In the former GDR the Mill produced sugar from 1950-1955 after it became abandoned. The Mill did not find a new owner after the reunification of Germany in 1989. In the year 1999 I had the chance to photograph the Mill before its blasting in 2012. All photographs are captured on 35mm black & white film.