Our Caledonia Camp is a living history experience that runs over an entire week, staying in a historic camp in the woods, on the banks of Loch Freuchie in Perthshire. We will be immersed in Scottish history and archaeology by paddling in coracles, cooking ancient recipes together on the fire, and learning heritage crafts such as blacksmithing, leatherworking, bronze casting, pottery, pigment and paint-making... as well as plenty of other small crafts and activities throughout the days and evenings spent around the fire with story telling and ancient songs. 

You can either join for just the weekend (Friday-Sunday) as a taster, stay for the week (Monday-Friday) to get access to those workshops and activities, or immerse yourself fully with the whole experience by joining us for the entire camp! (Friday-Friday).

Our aim is to travel back in time as a crafting community, making the things we need on the land, and look at how it all links to ancient Scottish history from the Iron Age to the early medieval period. We treat the camp as a historic campsite, so we will do our best to make everything comfortable, practical and historical, but also open to all and everyone! You do not need prior experience or historical equipment: though we encourage reenactors and enthusiasts to come in historic clothing, this is not a requirement. If you fancy trying on or wearing some historical clothes we will have spares on site and will advise those who want to make their own kit before arriving on site.

Several courses will be run each day by the tutors and participants will rotate through them to experience everything. Cooking is also done as a course, using ancient methods and utensils, and we will work together each day to learn while creating dishes that would have been eaten at the time. This means all food is included for the entire week with a mixed and balanced diet. The evenings will be a time to relax, enjoy the surroundings and camp-life as a group: a chance for the tutors to talk more about the history and archaeology of the crafts and the area, and enjoy the storytelling and musical performances. There will also be time for paddling the coracle boats and exploring by foot the local woodland and up into the hills for an optional (but highly recommended!) historic hike.

The weekend will be spent making small things on the forge, small leather pouches, pigments, and cooking.

During the week we will get more immersed with forging your own blade on the forge, making deerskin shoes and sheaths, making pots and candles, pigment making and painting on rawhide (including the boats!) and we will be casting a bronze sword together as a group. There will also be an option for a historic hike in kit at the end of the week and use all the lovely things you have made! We also have fantastic performances by Sean Parry on the loch by firelight, and we enjoy a shanty night for fun one evening too! It really is a jam packed week just bursting with courses from the highest skilled and passionate tutors, and so much fun activities to explore. Just see posts from last years camp! 

The site: Our camp is situated at Loch Freuchie which we have full access to. It is a loch right in the heartland of Scotland, bordering the ancient kingdoms of Pictland and Dal Riata. It even has the remains of a crannog on it! 

The team:

Organiser - Hamish Lamley - Pictavia Leather

Hamish is an expert in ancient Pictish history & archaeology. He has worked as a historical consultant and Pictish craftsman for television, and has over a decade of experience as a reconstruction specialist in hide tanning and leatherwork, leather boat (coracle) building, and more recently in Pictish tattooing.

Caroline Nicolay - Pario Gallico

With a background in archaeology Caroline specialises in studying and presenting various aspects of Iron Age life and crafts to the public, through hands-on courses and experiential archaeology. After focusing on historical cooking techniques and diets for the last 7years, she now works on ancient paints and pigment-making practices as well as traditional building skills.

Thomas Timbrell - Heritage Blades

Thomas is a professional bladesmith, cutler and living historian. He specialises in creating highly accurate archeological reconstructions of tools and cutlery from across Europe, believing that through the use of these items, we can gain a better understanding of life in the past.

Emma Harrison - Bogborn crafts

Emma is an experimental archaeologist turned potter and craftsperson. With a keen interest in everything prehistoric to early medieval, and crafting replica pottery in bonfires around Scotland over the past few years, inspired by archaeological finds and historical inspired methods. Otherwise she works on the potters wheel making both historical inspired and modern pots amongst other crafts and living history bits and pieces.

Neil Burridge - Bronze Age Swords

Neil is a Bronze Age metal specialist & master bronze swords smith with over 2 decades experience of working with prehistoric replicas.

Sean Parry - Taranau & Sacred Knot 

Sean is a phenomenal Welsh folk singer and musician. He will be performing some of the oldest Celtic songs from the British isles in his native tongue Welsh, and reciting some of the 6th century poem Y Goddodin, which memorialises the battle of Catraeth. 

Pricing:

Weekend experience ticket Saturday/Sunday afternoon= £400

Weekday experience ticket Monday to Friday afternoon =£800

Full week experience (Friday to Friday) =£1,100

All tickets include food (all meals are provided) and free parking. 

Additional details:

Site: This event is not accessible via public transport as it’s out in the wild. We will offer a shuttle run to pick people up from the nearest town Crieff (accessible by bus from Perth) for those that don’t have a car, to facilitate attendance. It is approximately a leisurely 20 minute walk from the parking area down to the campsite on the loch. All equipment/bags will be driven down much closer to the site, along with anybody with mobility issues and our team will help with carrying etc. we aim to provide as much as possible allowing you to pack light though.

Facilities: we may be living in historic times, but we do have a compost loo hidden in a canvas tent for comfort. For washing, there is the conveniently placed loch!

Our age limit is a minimum 18 years, please get in touch if you’d like to discuss this.  

Unfortunately we are not allowed dogs on site. 

After purchasing your ticket you will receive an email with further details on the course, but feel free to also get in touch at hamish@pictavialeather.co.uk if you have any questions.