Photographs Of Newcastle

The Baltic Flour Mill was built by Rank Hovis to a late-1930s design by architects Gelder and Kitchen and completed in 1950. It was extended in 1957 by the addition of an animal feed mill. The mill was closed in 1981. It was one of a number of mills located along the banks of the Tyne, all of which, due to their size, were prominent local landmarks. The Spillers mill just downstream from the Baltic on the north bank of the river was demolished in 2011. Another large mill was owned by the CWS and was located just upstream of Dunston Staithes.

Dominic Williams of Ellis Williams Architects won an architectural design competition, managed by RIBA Competitions, in the mid-1990s to convert the 1950s Baltic Flour Mill into a centre for art. After ten years in the planning and a capital investment of £50m, including £33.4m from the Arts Council Lottery Fund, Baltic opened to the public at midnight on Saturday 13 July 2002. The inaugural exhibition, B.OPEN, had work by Chris Burden, Carsten Holler, Julian Opie, Jaume Plensa and Jane and Louise Wilson and attracted over 35,000 visitors in the first week. An early exhibit of the Japanese artist Yoshitomo Nara, a Japanese girl, can be seen in the window of the east elevation.

Description courtesy of Wikipedia.