This paper describes the formulation and verification of a novel observer of wind parameters. The general idea behind the proposed approach is to consider the wind turbine rotor as an anemometer. In fact, the rotor responds to varying wind conditions; by properly interpreting this response, one can indirectly measure some desired wind characteristics, as for example yaw and shear, as described here. Measurements of wind conditions obtained this way are not affected by the usual disturbances of existing sensors, for example when installed in the nacelle or in the rotor wake. Furthermore, the approach provides rotor-equivalent quantities, and not the typical point information provided by wind vanes, anemometers or other similar sensors, whose information might be too local for large rotors. The proposed method is here formulated for the observation of wind direction and vertical shear. The new observer is demonstrated first in a comprehensive simulation study using high-fidelity aeroservoelastic models, and then experimentally using an aeroelastically-scaled wind tunnel model. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.