Prague - Windmill of the Brevnov Monastery

The tower of the former windmill, now in Na Větrníku Street, was built as part of the Baroque reconstruction of the entire Břevnov monastery (1701-1721) under the direction of Kryštof Dietzenhofer, probably in 1721 (according to some sources in 1722).

Originally, it was a farmyard belonging to the Břevnov monastery from the end of the 17th century with a wooden mill from 1277, built by the then abbot of the monastery, Abbot Godefrid. The foundations of the building date back to the 10th century.

The first pictorial evidence of the existence of a new Dutch-style windmill on the present site dates from 1721, when an engraving of a general view of the grounds of the Břevnov monastery was printed, based on an earlier drawing by Kilian Ignaz Dientzenhofer. The mill was therefore built at the latest during this construction phase of the monastery. The windmill has the year 1722 engraved on the plaster in the gable, perhaps related to the completion of the Břevnov Monastery.

The mill's cylindrical tower powered the mill equipment and the sawmill and employed one worker. Grain was milled for the monastery until 1794, when Jakub Kohoutek, a miller from Nesvačil u Bystřice, bought it as part of the Josephine reforms. In 1840, when Franz Kohoutek is mentioned as the owner, a second brick mill was built, the so-called Little Tower, which was functional until about 1900 and then demolished.

In 1848, the sister of the well-known patriot Petr Fastr was a miller in Větrník.

In 1899, the building was purchased by the famous Prague restorer and commander of the National Guard Jan Josef Černohorský as a ruin. In 1900 he added a residential building to the mill building. In the courtyard he built a summer restaurant, which operated successfully until about 1927. In 1912 the Opatrný family acquired the premises.

The mill worked until 1890.

The Břevnov Mill is a cylindrical building with a diameter and height of 9 m, it has two floors and is topped with a low conical roof covered with beaver tubes. The façade has been repaired in the Neo-Renaissance style and is decorated with a bossage. On the upper floors there are broken windows with a semicircular recess and a main arch. The cornice is decorated with dentils and a meander. A spiral staircase adjoins the tower.

It is one of the oldest preserved windmill buildings in the Czech Republic.

After 1990, the Opatrný family regained both buildings and the land in restitution, gradually repaired them and after 2000, in addition to the restaurant, a guesthouse with a fenced park, part of the forest and a tennis court was built here.