Moulin Saint-Pierre (St. Peter Mill), Arles

Saint Peter Mill has gained renown as the windmill associated with 19th-century author Alphonse Daudet, although he neither lived there nor owned it. Still, this evocative site inspired him deeply-much like the place depicted in his celebrated work Letters from My Windmill. A modest museum within the mill’s basement displays exhibits celebrating the author and the Provence that shaped his pen.

Constructed around 1814, the mill operated for about a century, processing wheat until the upheavals of World War I brought its active days to an end. After decades of neglect, in 1935, the local group “The Friends of Alphonse Daudet” initiated its restoration as a museum dedicated to Daudet's memory. Eventually reopened to the public in 2016, it now stands as both monument and muse.

This picturesque structure features a cylindrical stone tower set atop a hillside foundation. Its conical roof supports a wind-alignment mechanism known as a “wind vane”, enabling the rotating sails-four wooden frames some 6 m in span-to catch the wind. Inside, a spiral staircase wraps around a thick wall, guiding visitors upward through the old mill’s machinery, including the wooden shaft, lantern, and millstones, still reminders of its industrial past.