The recent sale of Puunene Mill to Oahu-based construction company Nan Inc. has left Haiku multimedia artist Tom Sewell scrambling to find new homes for the myriad of pieces he has collected and created, most out of items left behind when the sugar mill was shuttered in 2016.

“They gave us a week and a half to get out,” Sewell said Wednesday afternoon as he and two helpers used a forklift to shuttle sheets of scrap steel to a flatbed truck parked outside the 17,000-square-foot former tractor repair shop that has been his studio and performance space for the past three years. “It was a good three years. This whole place came alive.”

Nan Inc. owner Nan Chul Shin reportedly purchased the mill and 300 acres from Alexander & Baldwin last week for an undisclosed price. The acreage includes land that is zoned industrial, commercial, agricultural and residential.

Nan Inc., is reportedly Hawaii’s largest locally owned construction company. It specializes in large-scale preconstruction, general contracting and design-build services statewide. It purchased Grace Pacific LLC from A&B in 2023. In a release marking the Grace Pacific sale, A&B called it the culmination of its “simplification strategy.”

A&B was left with the mill and surrounding property when it sold Hawaiian Commercial & Sugar Company’s 41,000 acres of agricultural farm land to Mahi Pono for $262 million in December of 2018. There were reports at the time saying A&B wanted to include the mill in the sale, but Mahi Pono was not interested. The original steam-powered mill was first built at the site in 1901. It had been expanded and modernized through the years, but still ran on steam technology.

Nan Inc. officials did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Vice President Wyeth Matsubara told Hawaii News Now earlier this week the company has no firm plans to tear the mill down, but would probably be doing “substantial demolition of at least interior machinery.” Matsubara said the company intends to “maximize the best uses of each property zoning,” and expressed interest in developing residential projects.

Across Hansen Road from Puunene Mill, the Alexander & Baldwin Sugar Museum sits on one of the parcels zoned residential. The museum’s 40-year lease for the property expires in 2047, but a clause in the lease says it could be relocated.

Sewell says he hopes the new owners keep the museum where it is and that they preserve the mill and its unique history. He envisions the mill serving as a living museum that is home to art studios, galleries, shops, restaurants, bars and entertainment venues.

“Industrial spaces like this all over the world have been turned into arts complexes and they have been very successful,” Sewell said. “Industrial buildings are really rare and cannot be duplicated. It would be a shame to be torn down. I’m hoping they will have some sense of what is going on around the world and realize its potential. It’s a natural for an arts district. It would be a perfect location.”

Sewell said the mill is one of the last monuments to an important period in Maui and Hawaii’s past. He points to the quality of its purpose-built construction and to how many lives it touched through the years.

“It’s the history of it,” he said. “I feel that it is a really important piece of history. This mill was the center of economic activity in this part of the island. This is a rare thing, a mill of this size.”

Sewell’s gallery, Enigma of the Mill Studio 3, is located on Old Puunene Road. It is scheduled to be open Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., until it too is shuttered. He is having a half-off sale which includes photos and works of art, as well as random equipment he salvaged from dumpsters after the mill closed.

“It’s an eclectic collection of odds and ends,” he said in a release. “Take home a piece of the historic 140-year-old factory, some for free, some for half off, some very expensive, heavy and large.”

* Staff Writer Matthew Thayer can be reached at mthayer@mauinews.com.