What’s Happening
Paradise play
A long, long time ago, during the 16th or early 17th century, a group of Germans migrated to a little island on the Danube called Oberufer. With them, they brought a cycle of religious plays which had been passed on to them by tradition from their ancestors. When Karl...
Our Narrow Boat Holiday
In July, an Esk Valley crew headed to Anderton Marina to commandeer the Black Necked Swan narrow boat for a week cruising the canals of Cheshire. As the name would suggest, a narrow boat is in fact quite narrow. There are four bunk beds at the front and four at the...
Community Earth Festival
When the Community Earth Festival was conceived by Esk Valley Camphill Community in late 2021, none of us could have imagined what it would grow into. Indeed, so varied and wide-ranging have been the 40 odd events across the area over the summer, that it is really...
Sharing our Lives conference
In February, Esk Valley Camphill Community hosted an inclusive conference for life sharing communities in the English region. This involved around 30 community members from Sturts Farm, The Mount, Gannicox, as well as several other small life sharing initiatives....
The Value of Work
The well-being of a community of people working together will be the greater, the less the individual claims for himself the proceeds of his work, i.e. the more of these proceeds he makes over to his fellow-workers, the more his own needs are satisfied, not out of his...
James Wins a Human Rights Award
We were thrilled to learn that James Harris has won the Shared Lives Plus human rights award for free expression. Each year it is given to a person supported by a Shared Lives carer for speaking their mind, growing in confidence, and living the life they choose. James...
Art Exhibition
In June, a group of EVCC artists exhibited their paintings in a small community gallery in a Middlesbrough shopping centre. It's a modest place and yet the two people who run it, Adrian and Miranda, have worked miracles with it. It’s such an inviting space where...
The Homecoming of Odysseus
Over many years, Botton-as-it-used-to-be would set aside a week in July or August for summer school. All but essential work came to a halt and pretty much the whole community devoted itself to a project, usually culminating in a performance of some kind (even if there...
New garden season
With the echoes of Candlemas, and perhaps Imbolc for some of us, we make our ways into the nourishing realm of spring. The snowdrops are living up to their name and painting the soil with green and white, and the daffodils are poking their heads up, although their...
Advent Fair, and The Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future
If 2021 has been about trying to adapt to the New Normal in a pandemic world, for our community the question has been about how to retain a healthy social life while we navigate through the changes. Too often, we find ourselves having to cancel the events we have...