March 2025
Inspired Nature Walking & Art-Making Day
10am-4pm, Sunday 23rd March
A one-day workshop with Eleanor Minney
About the event:
Join us for a day of walking & art-making, in the restorative grounds of Braziers Park. Participants will explore ways in which mindfulness can support these ancient practices to become therapeutic for wellbeing. Using the shelter of a characterful former cowshed set amongst orchards, we will be based outdoors for the day, with easy access to warm drinks and indoors if it is very cold and/or wet. Adults from any walk of life are warmly welcome. No artistic experience required – the art-making will be focused on expression rather than technical skills. Art materials, lunch, and refreshments will be provided.
What can I expect?
* The Day workshop intends to offer retreat and resource, allowing our inherent creativity to unfold.
* Ideal for enabling connection to other people and the rest of nature, we will be in a small group taking mindful walks and practicing art-making.
* We will explore themes of wellbeing that are meaningful for you.
What will the day include?
* Guided/self-guided walks with optional mindfulness guidance.
* Social connection and sharing in a small group.
* Therapeutic art-making time – e.g. drawing with pencil, ink, pen, crayon, pastels. Painting with ink or watercolour, or watercolour pencils. Use of fabric or making collage. Invitation to collect natural materials, photos or rubbings of texture.
“Before the walking meditations, Eleanor’s gentle suggestions helped me ground myself, focus on my breath and tune in to the beautiful nature around us. I felt a deep connection to the natural world which I haven’t had for a long time and came away from the day’s course with a desire and intention to practise more mindfulness walking and to take my drawing into the outside World more often in the hope of finding some of that inner peace experienced during the practice. It was a day full of joyful stillness, creativity and connection. Thank you Eleanor for your calm and open guidance.” – Kate
About the facilitator:
Eleanor is a warm and welcoming artist facilitator, based in Oxford. She has experience working and volunteering in a variety of mental health contexts and has also trained in psychotherapy.
www.eleanorminneydrawing.co.uk
INKredible Flow: An Introduction to Marbling
10am-4pm, Saturday 29th March
A creative one-day workshop with Charise Clarke
About the event:
Come and join us for an enchanting day of marbling. This traditional craft originated over 1200 years ago. In the UK, marbling has adorned books for centuries and is now experiencing a global revival. Over the course of the day, you will learn the fascinating history and basic techniques of marbling. We will begin with an introduction to marbling theory and explore a few beginner patterns. Using inks suspended on a water bath, you will create captivating designs that will be transferred onto various materials which you can take home including paper prints, leaves, pebbles, a fan, cotton, and glass. This inclusive workshop is a perfect chance to connect with like-minded individuals and enjoy a playful, creative experience with inks.
About the facilitator:
Charise from Marble Mad is an artist based in The Vale of Glamorgan, Wales. She started marbling in the pandemic and what started out as a hobby quickly became an obsession. Charise loves the sensory, intuitive, and meditative aspects of marbling. “Instead of stressing about trying to draw something perfectly, you play with colour and pattern till you achieve an image that you like. There is no right or wrong and every piece is beautiful chaos, a one-off, that can never be recreated. This art form offers so much opportunity for exploration with the ability to marble materials such as paper, leaves, pebbles, bone, shells, glass, wood and fabric. The sky really is the limit.”
Oops Audio UK Spring Event 2025
4pm Monday 31st March – 4pm Wednesday 2nd April
About the event:
Oops Audio UK Spring Event 2025
Oops Audio®, a Scandinavian Hi-Fi brand, invites you to Braziers Park from March 31st to April 2nd, 2025. This event is designed to be more of a hands-on event rather than a demonstration only – an exercise in exploring deep listening in a relaxed, inspiring atmosphere among fellow LP enthusiasts. This special three-day event also marks the UK debut of Oops Audio.
At the heart of Oops Audio is the Wallop™ turntable, a hand-built deck crafted with fine carpentry where the materials enhance performance. Wallop™ reflects our deep love for music and our commitment to value-based sustainable development, good design, and the joy of connecting people. It’s a straightforward, no-frills product that relies on clever construction—no digital tweaks—essentially a turntable as you remember it. Some may call it quirky and different; we say, “back to the future” with craftsmanship that brings peace and joy. Each turntable is unique, personalized by name, and geotagged. Attendees at the event will have the exclusive opportunity to sign up for their own Wallop™ turntable.
In addition to the Wallop™ turntable, the event will feature Oops Audio’s full-range Oomph™ loudspeaker, the Lejonklou Slipsik-8 MM-RIAA, and Moonriver Audio Model 404 integrated reference amplifier. You’ll have the chance to experience these products while spinning your favorite LPs and sharing music with other enthusiasts.
Slipsik 8 | Lejonklou https://www.lejonklou.com/products/slipsik/
The 404 integrated amplifier – Moonriver Audio https://moonriveraudio.com/the-404-integrated-amplifier/
About the facilitators:
Torsten Salander and Jonas Lenberg foster a long-standing connection with Braziers Park, with Jonas’ involvement from the late 1980s and Torsten’s in the early 2000s. Although they are primarily based in Sweden, they actively participate in the community’s activities from a distance. Over the years, they have contributed to various projects, including significant restoration works throughout the house and grounds at Braziers Park. Torsten’s expertise as a master carpenter combined with Jonas’ passion for practical work has made maintenance projects particularly important to them.
Accommodation:
You can choose to stay overnight at Braziers Park in either a shared or single room with full accommodation, or simply join for the day. Day visitors are welcome to attend with lunch. Since space is limited, we recommend booking early. For more information on nearby accommodations or room availability, contact admin@braziers.org.uk.
For any questions or further details, feel free to contact at info@oopsaudio.se. We look forward to sharing this magical experience with you.
Click here for the Event Agenda
April 2025
Recognise & Appreciate the Joy in your Life!
Friday 11th – Sunday 13th April
About the event:
Join us for a delightful, restorative two-night break at Braziers Park, situated in the beautiful area of Oxfordshire. Participants will enjoy lots of fabulous movement to increase your mobility, flexibility, strength and balance. Movement classes are accessible to most people, however, please check with the instructor for more details. The weekend will include: mindfulness meditation, mindful activities, walking in nature, delicious homemade vegetarian/vegan food, friendship and fun!
The weekend of activities will be wrapped up in a blanket of compassion and kindness towards ourselves and others.
Start to let go of negative habits, thoughts and behaviours as we take a look at where and who we want to be. Change is possible for us all as we recognise and celebrate the JOY in our lives.
If you have any questions, please contact the course instructor Audrajean at mindfulmovementaudrajean@gmail.com.
Click here for more information and to book
Kids Go Wild!
10am-noon, Sunday 13th April
Forest School session with Charlotte Allchin
About the event:
A monthly fun-filled Forest School session led by qualified Forest School leader Charlotte Allchin in 55 acres of meadows and woodland. Suitable for all ages and whatever the weather – dress accordingly, it might get mucky! Varied activities outdoors in nature. One adult only may attend with each child or family group. Limited places. NB: All dates for 2025 now bookable.
Braziers Park Self-Led Residency: Extended Easter Weekend
3pm Friday 18th – 4pm Monday 21st April
About this event:
Join us for a restful and recuperative residency at Braziers Park, during the extended Easter weekend. Braziers Park offers a unique setting to mark the beginning of spring, surrounded by 55 acres of natural beauty. From the 18th-21st of April, we are opening our house for all those seeking stillness during the holiday season. Whether you wish to immerse yourself in the rhythms of community life, retreat into peaceful surroundings, or dedicate time to your creative practice, Braziers Park provides the space for you to focus, relax, and recharge.
While there is no structured agenda to the weekend, you are welcome to contribute to community life through shared tasks and activities or to simply enjoy your time in whatever way suits you best. This is an opportunity to step away from the everyday, reconnect with yourself, and embrace the harmony of Braziers Park. Whether you come for solitude or for shared experience, we welcome you to shape your stay in a way that feels right for you.
This residency functions as a BnB-style retreat, offering accommodation for three nights (Friday to Monday). We provide a range of communal spaces for work, reflection and creativity; these include a study and library, various shared indoor spaces and expansive outdoor grounds. Meals are available on a sliding scale, allowing you to choose which meals you wish to partake in. Prices start from £25 per night.
For more information, please email events@braziers.org.uk.
Opening to Silence
4pm Friday 25th – 2pm Sunday 27th April
A silent retreat with Sandy Chubb & Sam Settle
About the event:
This is a mostly silent meditation and yoga retreat, where you can discover that – amazingly – you are completely fulfilled from the start. Sam Settle and Sandy Chubb will offer plenty of silence to give you a chance to become intimate with the presence of who you are. As the mind and heart becomes quiet, the ego rests itself too. Then it all begins. The asana and pranayama sessions will free the body so you can sit easily in meditation. Braziers Park is set in a beautiful landscape. There will be times to enjoy it by day and under the moon and stars by night. Whether you have little or lots of experience of silent meditation and yoga retreats, you are welcome.
About the facilitators:
Sandy Chubb is a British Wheel of Yoga (BWY) teacher and Zen Teacher with the Oxford Zen Centre. She served as the Director of the Prison Phoenix Trust from 2000 to 2010.
Sam Settle is a BWY teacher and a Zen student. He served as Prison Phoenix Trust Director from 2010 to 2020.
Course fees:
This is a residential course, so tickets include two nights’ accommodation and all meals from Friday supper to Sunday lunch, plus refreshments.
There are different rates available for people in different financial situations, so please choose your rate when filling in the payment section. Prices range from £190 to £320.
For more information on the course, please email education@braziers.org.uk.
May 2025
May Fayre Open Day 2025
11am-4pm, Monday 5th May
About the event:
Once again, Braziers Park will be open for our annual May Fayre celebrations. As ever, there will be live music, creative drop-in sessions, food and drinks, activities for children and families, and most importantly – Maypole dancing! This is a free event, however booking is essential. Parking is charged at £5 per vehicle. All proceeds at this event will go towards supporting Braziers in our charitable aims.
Our full programme will be published closer to the date.
Oxfordshire Art Weeks 2025
Saturday 10th – Sunday 18th May, 11am-7pm (weekdays), 10am-5pm (weekends)
About the event:
Celebrating 75 years of intentional community living: Join us during the 2025 Oxfordshire Art Weeks for free-access exhibitions, creative workshops with the exhibiting artists, and weekend tea room (2-4pm on both weekends). More information and workshop booking forms will be available soon. This is a free event. For more general information and to explore Oxfordshire Art Weeks’ full 2025 programme, please visit: https://www.artweeks.org/
“Who lives here?”
10am-11:30am & 2pm-3:30pm, Saturday 10th May
A creative workshop for children as part of Oxfordshire Art Weeks
About the event:
This workshop will encourage children to respond imaginatively to the Braziers Park house and gardens through sketching, drawing and collage. The workshop will start outside, sketching parts of the front of the house and, back inside, adding ideas by completing the drawing using photographic references. The children will add collaged windows and we will then guide an imaginative response to encourage their thinking about who or what may live in a house like this. The children will then draw their ideas in the windows of inhabitants looking out. Finishing touches may include printed textures or collaged details such as plants and trees. This workshop is aimed at children aged between 6-12 years.
About the facilitator:
Catherine Hale is a self-taught artist living and working in the Chilterns Hills. She uses mixed media to create paintings that oscillate between abstraction and figuration. Walking provides inspiration for her works that suggest visual journeys and a narrative response to the landscape. Within her practice, Catherine is drawn to fragments that catch the eye – pools of light, unusual forms or incongruities and juxtapositions in the countryside. What she sees ignites her imagination and evokes memories and emotions. As a teacher, she has a life-long interest in children as artists and she continues to support young people in responding creatively to heritage as part of her work for a local charity. Over the years her skills and knowledge of the creative process have been enhanced by inspirational teaching at Sunningwell School of Art, Ruskin College of Art, and St Ives School of Painting where she has recently completed the year long Porthmeor Programme.
Glaister Lecture 2025: The Reinvigoration of A Community
11am-1pm, Sunday 11th May
Free event with optional lunch
About the event:
The year 2025 marks the 75th anniversary of Braziers Park. This year’s Glaister Lecture will reflect on the long history of Braziers from a community perspective and in relation to wider issues such as resilience. Led by long-term resident and Braziers’ head gardener Sarah Wood, the talk will have a special focus on the past four years and explore how the organisation recovered from rock bottom in 2020.
About the speaker:
Sarah Wood (MSc Oxon) has been involved with Braziers Park for over thirty years and lived here for nearly half this time. She is a committed community member and Braziers’ head gardener.
This is a free event, but booking is essential. Optional lunch is available.
Kids Go Wild!
10am-noon, Sunday 11th May
Forest School session with Charlotte Allchin
About the event:
A monthly fun-filled Forest School session led by qualified Forest School leader Charlotte Allchin in 55 acres of meadows and woodland. Suitable for all ages and whatever the weather – dress accordingly, it may get mucky! Varied activities outdoors in nature. One adult only may attend with each child or family group. Limited places. NB: All dates for 2025 now bookable.
Credit: Laura Selby, soil-chromatographic printing at Braziers Park
SOIL Wider Community Weekend: Celebrating all this earthy!
4pm Friday 23rd – 3pm Monday 26th May
About the event:
Braziers Park has a long history in hosting so-called ‘Wider Community Weekends’, where people come together for an often extended weekend to exchange skills, stories, and experiences. Braziers’ second Wider Community Weekend this year will be curated around the theme ofsoil and will take the shape of a gathering – celebrating all things earthy!
The main focus of this gathering will be on building and promoting a healthy relationship with the ground below our feet and to explore the rich life that exists within our soil ecosystems. Some of the planned activities include organic seed and plant swapping, clay harvesting and sculpting in the Braziers landscape, community gardening and planting, deep-listening and earthy reading sessions, community restoring of Braziers’ wood-fired kiln, muddy painting for children (and adults), garden tours, including an introduction to Braziers’ mushroom growing project, nettle foraging, cooking and bread-baking, soil chromatographic printing, and much much more.
Our Wider Community Weekends are a great opportunity to get to know our community and mutually exchange experiences and skills. Our SOIL Wider Community Weekend is the second in a series of three weekends, engaging with our 2025 theme of SOIL ~ SOUL ~ SOCIETY – based on the peace and environmental activist Satish Kumar’s ideas explored in his 2013 book Soil, Soul, Society: A New Trinity of Our Time. In his book, Satish invites us to think of us, humans, as members of a one-earth society, and claims that caring for the earth and soul is interrelated.
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Join us for either a day or the extended weekend. In-house accommodation and camping options available (see different ticket options and prices below). This gathering welcomes people of all ages, including well-behaved dogs outside and on leads.
The full programme will be published closer to the date.
June 2025
ONIONS AND…a circular exploration of waste
10am-4pm, Saturday 7th June
About this event:
Combining textiles with one of the most common kitchen wastes: onion skins. ONIONS AND… leans on the ancient techniques of natural dyes to demonstrate how waste can and must be turn into something else; whether this is of utilitarian purpose, or a textile piece that offers us space for contemplation, both are valid. We collect and select onions skins and other kitchen waste during the process, where foraging is encouraged as part of the same process. Then we set the dye bath, initially with onion skins alone, then we will be adding different plants materials according to what we find.
While the dye bath is in progress, attendees will use that time to create a bundle-dye. This technique is also known as eco-print, which is a beautiful alchemical process, that uses the natural dyes from flowers, leaves, and other plant material to create herbal-infused prints.
One of the workshop’s aims is encouraging people to rethink their consumption habits, in order to minimise waste.
ONIONS AND… will provide opportunities for attendees to learn the basics of natural dyes process, accompany by an easy to follow steps by steps guide for them to take home. We will explore existing initiatives and organisations focused on natural dyes, literature, and resources.
About the facilitator:
Elizabeth Salazar, a creative practicioner from Venezuela, intricately weaves her art with textiles, plants, and natural dyes, offering a poignant reconnection to nature and her South American heritage. Through her work, Elizabeth sheds light on the ecological imbalances inflicted upon Earth by our excessive consumption of its resources. Her art becomes a tapestry, beautifully illustrating the delicate relationship between humanity and the environment.
Family Day Retreat: Yoga, Meditation, Creativity and Soundbath for Young People and Their Adults
Saturday 7th June, 10:30am-4:30pm
About this event:
Exercises and activities to promote calm, connection, creativity…and a pinch of craziness too, for young people (7-11) and their grown-ups. We’ll explore a wide range of activities, including: yoga, massage, mindful creativity, meditation, and a soundbath using gongs, singing bowls and chimes. All activities will take a consent-based framework: each participant is welcome to engage in whatever way feels most comfortable for them, and will be encouraged to practice communicating wants, needs, and boundaries with those they attend with.
About the facilitator:
Anna is an Oxford-based facilitator, whose work includes yoga, meditation, soundbaths, mindful creativity, and self-directed learning for young people. She is passionate about promoting rest, encouraging self-expression, and exploring human connection and our relationship to the natural world.
Healing Plants of Summer: Ancestral and Sacred Herbs of this Land
9:30am Saturday 7th June – 5pm Sunday 8th June 2025
About the event:
This weekend at Braziers we will explore the natural histories, sacred connections and medicinal powers of wild and garden plants that are growing on this land. Touching into the herbal lore of ancient times here, we will go on a journey from garden to meadow to wood to experience the support of the wild world as the ancestors did. We will sit with an assortment of plants that were revered by people 1000 years ago, meet their spirits, learn their stories through time and make their medicine.
About the facilitator:
Rasheeqa Ahmad (Hedge Herbs) is a medical herbalist in her community in Walthamstow in north London. She has been practicing since 2012, offering treatment with herbal medicine and teaching about its many aspects, alongside a wider mix of work whose aim is reconnecting us as communities with the potential of this knowledge and craft as a way to support healthier living systems and relationships. She is inspired by her early involvement with the Radical Herbalism Gathering in exploring how to make plant medicine accessible and restore balance to its practice in the contexts of systemic inequalities and oppressions that are part of our shared histories.
She is part of Community Apothecary Waltham Forest in her locality, a social enterprise that brings community members together around a patchwork of medicinal herb gardens where they can learn about growing and making medicines together, exchanging knowledge and peer support and seeding the model in other neighbourhoods so that we create landscapes of healing everywhere.
Living Fibres I: Foraging, Twisting, Weaving
10am-5pm, Sunday 8th June 2025
About this event:
Through this workshop, participants will have an opportunity to experiment with different plant fibres from the Braziers Park landscape. In the morning, we will identify, forage and process plants that can be made into cordage. In the afternoon, we will explore different techniques – weaving, looping, coiling – that enable us to build up different forms using our cordage.
Participants will be encouraged to pick, snap, split, scrape, and prod plants, getting to know them and their weaving affordances. The emphasis will not be on having a perfected piece to take home. Instead, the focus will be on taking home skills and inspiration, creating space for experimentation, risks, and new understandings.
This is the first of two Living Fibres workshops. It can be attended as a stand-alone workshop or as the first of the two-part series.
About the facilitator:
Fred’s work combines experience in community arts, visual anthropology & agroecology. He is particularly interested in producing work that engages with both the materials and politics of different landscapes. His most recent work responds to the plants he encounters as part of his work on a small-scale vegetable farm in North Oxfordshire. This has led to experiments with cordage, coiled basketry, and most recently – thanks to funding from Arts Council England – the construction of camera obscurae.
Kids Go Wild!
10am-noon, Sunday 8th June
Forest School session with Charlotte Allchin
About the event:
A monthly fun-filled Forest School session led by qualified Forest School leader Charlotte Allchin in 55 acres of meadows and woodland. Suitable for all ages and whatever the weather – dress accordingly, it might get mucky! Varied activities outdoors in nature. One adult only may attend with each child or family group. Limited places. NB: All dates for 2025 now bookable.
July 2025
Kids Go Wild!
10am-noon, Sunday 13th July
Forest School session with Charlotte Allchin
About the event:
A monthly fun-filled Forest School session led by qualified Forest School leader Charlotte Allchin in 55 acres of meadows and woodland. Suitable for all ages and whatever the weather – dress accordingly, it might get mucky! Varied activities outdoors in nature. One adult only may attend with each child or family group. Limited places. NB: All dates for 2025 now bookable.
Agradezco Festival
10am Friday 18th – 11am Sunday 20th July 2025
About the event:
Agradezco Festival is a space where individuals and families can come together in harmony, free from alcohol and drugs, to experience the transformative power of connection and creativity.
Our festival is rooted in gratitude – we have been deeply blessed on our personal journeys, and this event is our way of giving back to the universe. Through music, meaningful workshops, and shared moments of reflection, we invite you to join us in celebrating life, growth, and the beauty of being together.
Let us unite in a spirit of love, peace and mutual respect, creating a space where all are welcome to grow , heal and connect .
Festival performances:
* Labolatorium Piesni (Song Laboratory)
* Mobius Loop
* Alex Akal
* Hearty Melodies
* Joanna Red
* Raninbea and Barinette
* Michal and his Tribe Journey
* Retro Firefly (Samantha)
* Hit the Dhol
* Mice in the Matchbox
* Ananda Flow
* nna Carlyle
* EarthStar
* Force of Nature
* Natural Right
… and many more.
Click here for more information and booking
The Reunion 2025
Monday 28th July – Friday 1st August
About the event:
Stefan & Ranka invite you to the annual reunion of former Braziers volunteers and residents (also known as the house team in the past). This invitation is open to anyone who has volunteered or been a resident at Braziers in the past. It will give you a good opportunity to visit Braziers again and to renew friendships with others. Some sessions will be arranged in due course but the principal aim of this event is to enjoy friendly chatting, excursions and just being together in the beautiful place you once stayed. Of course you can bring your family or friends too.
Please note that the fee (£32 a day per person) is on a half-time working basis. Every participant will be expected to work alongside others at Braziers every morning (or afternoon if preparing dinner). If you have any enquiry or want to find out about children’s prices please contact Braziers Park (admin@braziers.org.uk) and Stefan Preiss (stefan.preiss@gmx.net).
August 2025
Braziers International Film Festival
4pm Friday 29th – 4pm Sunday 31st August
About the event:
Braziers International Film Festival (BIFF) is an annual three-day independent film festival held at Braziers Park. The festival features several programmes of international films, including special focus programmes, installations, performances, and discussions.
Screened inside Braziers’ historic 17th century barn, the programmes include documentary, animation, fiction and contemporary artists’ film & video. Curated by artist Nick Jordan, the films are selected from an open call by a team of artist-filmmakers, who run the festival as a not-for-profit collective, with proceeds going to Braziers Park.
Screenings are followed by group discussion and Q&A with attending film-makers, who are invited to Braziers.
Some of the artist-filmmakers who have screened at the festival in recent years include Rehab Nazzal, Maryam Tafakory, Jennet Thomas, Mike Hoolboom, Niina Lehtonen Braun, David Leister, Oreet Ashrey, Paul Tarragó, Claudia Claremi, and Carla Simón. Special-focus programmes and performances have included Jumana Manna, Julia Parks, Amy Cutler, Bea Haut, Karel Doing, Mary Stark & David Chatton Barker (Folklore Tapes), Vague Research Studios, and BEEF (Bristol Experimental Expanded Film).
The full screening programme will be published closer to the date.
Click here for more information on the festival
September 2025
Kids Go Wild!
10am-noon, Sunday 14th September
Forest School session with Charlotte Allchin
About the event:
A monthly fun-filled Forest School session led by qualified Forest School leader Charlotte Allchin in 55 acres of meadows and woodland. Suitable for all ages and whatever the weather – dress accordingly, it might get mucky! Varied activities outdoors in nature. One adult only may attend with each child or family group. Limited places. NB: All dates for 2025 now bookable.
Harvest-Time Herbals: Entering Autumn with Medicinal Stores for The Dark Time
9:30am Saturday 27th – 5pm Sunday 28th September 2025
About the event:
We will spend a weekend drawing in from the land, preparing harvests of the summer season into healing medicines for the cold times. Learn about specific herbal techniques including tincture making, syrups, elixirs, vinegars and electuaries, specific for the respiratory, circulatory and immune systems as the energy shifts.
Meet the plants of the autumn that support our health at this time, and gather knowledge about how to bring them into your daily life for greater winter wellbeing.
About the facilitator:
Rasheeqa Ahmad (Hedge Herbs) is a medical herbalist in her community in Walthamstow in north London. She has been practicing since 2012, offering treatment with herbal medicine and teaching about its many aspects, alongside a wider mix of work whose aim is reconnecting us as communities with the potential of this knowledge and craft as a way to support healthier living systems and relationships. She is inspired by her early involvement with the Radical Herbalism Gathering in exploring how to make plant medicine accessible and restore balance to its practice in the contexts of systemic inequalities and oppressions that are part of our shared histories.
Rasheeqa is part of Community Apothecary Waltham Forest in her locality, a social enterprise that brings community members together around a patchwork of medicinal herb gardens where they can learn about growing and making medicines together, exchanging knowledge and peer support and seeding the model in other neighbourhoods so that we create landscapes of healing everywhere.
Living Fibres II: Gleaning & Coiling
10am-5pm, Sunday 28th September
About this event:
During this workshop, participants will have an opportunity to explore different plant fibres from the Braziers Park landscape, working with them to create coiled bowls and baskets. Participants will get to know a wide range of different crop residues, as well as to glean their own materials from our beautiful Walled Garden. Over the course of the day, we will use coiled basketry techniques to work these materials into different vessels. Participants will be encouraged to pick, snap, split, scrape, and prod plants, getting to know them and their weaving affordances. The emphasis will not be on having a perfected piece to take home. Instead, the focus will be on taking home skills and inspiration, creating space for experimentation, risks, and new understandings. This is the second of two Living Fibres workshops. It can be attended as a stand-alone workshop or as the second of the two-part series.
About the facilitator:
Fred Branson’s work combines experience in community arts, visual anthropology & agroecology. He is particularly interested in producing work that engages with both the materials and politics of different landscapes. His most recent work responds to the plants he encounters as part of his work on a small-scale vegetable farm in North Oxfordshire. This has led to experiments with cordage, coiled basketry, and most recently – thanks to funding from Arts Council England – the construction of camera obscura.
October 2025
Life Drawing: Discovering Your Artistic Voice
10am-3pm, Sunday 12th October
About the event:
Come join us for a relaxed session of artistic self-expression through life drawing. This is the art of capturing the human figure from a live model and is a cherished tradition that transcends time and culture. This will be a valuable and personal creative experience whether you are a life drawing regular or have never attended a class. In this session, we go beyond striving for perfect proportions or likeness and aim to uncover the essence of the human form, expressing it in our own unique style and perspective. Aptly, we will be in the glorious Drawing Room, working with a professional nude model holding various short and longer poses. We will be seated around the model, using graphite and charcoal for our artistic exploration. If you prefer to use an easel or your own medium for sketching on paper, you are welcome to bring those along. Besides the creative aspect, we will discover that the joy of life drawing also lies in the meditative quality of the process, leaving behind the complexities of everyday life and promoting true presence. All the materials you need are provided, and the session will include 3 hours of drawing various poses, art history context, conversation and a delicious lunch.
About the facilitator:
This session is run by artist and designer, Ranjit Jhita. A self-confessed art obsessive, Ranjit has a particular love for figurative works throughout art history. He has spent many years in life drawing rooms, both sketching and facilitating. The challenge and thrill of discovering something new and valuable in himself and others has only intensified over the years. It’s with this enthusiasm that Ranjit currently runs the life drawing sessions in Goring & Streatley. In his own work, Ranjit draws deep inspiration from historical masters, particularly from the Renaissance to the mid-twentieth century. Striving for raw, honest marks, his aim is to give life to drawings that embrace historic, artistic discipline, but have a reality that is starkly of the present.
www.instagram.com/learningtolook
www.instagram.com/goringstreatley_lifedrawing
Kids Go Wild!
10am-noon, Sunday 19th October
Forest School session with Charlotte Allchin
About the event:
A monthly fun-filled Forest School session led by qualified Forest School leader Charlotte Allchin in 55 acres of meadows and woodland. Suitable for all ages and whatever the weather – dress accordingly, it might get mucky! Varied activities outdoors in nature. One adult only may attend with each child or family group. Limited places. NB: All dates for 2025 now bookable.
Conscious Evolution
10am-4pm, Saturday 25th October
A creative one-day workshop with Heather Lynch
About this event:
The Conscious Evolution Collage is a collaborative and creative workshop designed to help you understand and address the complex sustainability challenges of the 21st century. Through this workshop, you will access breakthrough knowledge and innovative ways of thinking, based on New World Together transdisciplinary research findings that can empower and enlighten you. During the workshop, you will work as a team with different sets of cards containing key information about the global sustainability challenges, their hidden root causes, and their solutions. Your mission is to use your individual and collective intelligence to connect the dots and organize the cards to have a clear picture that allows you to:
* Develop your sensemaking: learn to use a systemic approach to grasp the interrelated sustainability challenges threatening our globalised civilization as well as their fundamental causes.
* Expand your consciousness: recognise unsustainable behavior patterns, their past origins, hidden root causes, and how they are perpetuated beneath our collective level of awareness.
* Enhance your creative powers: identify individual, collective, and societal solutions that enable conscious change toward a sustainable and desirable future for all.
Who is this workshop for?
This workshop is for anyone who wishes to better understand the global sustainability challenges of our time and how they can contribute to the solution. It is also for those who want to connect with like-minded individuals and positive changemakers.
“The Conscious Evolution Collage was really insightful and Heather held the space beautifully allowing me and other participants the time to discuss, question and reflect so that we could expand our own understanding. Despite initially feeling relatively well versed on the topic, it hugely helped me to organise my thoughts and make connections which have already aided in deepening my understanding and excitement for a brighter picture of the future. It’s left me wanting more and keen to become a facilitator so that I can share this with my community too!” Chloe, Sustainability Advisor
About the facilitator:
Heather is deeply committed to creating a more regenerative world where people live in harmony with themselves, others, and nature. Her mission is to empower those working toward positive change to find greater happiness, fulfillment, and peace—helping them feel more aligned and empowered in their work. She supports individuals who feel stuck, overwhelmed, or uncertain about their impact or the future, through 1:1 coaching to support people wanting to make a positive difference to live more joyful lives aligned with their values. Heather also works with organisations, delivering workshops and talks on emotional resilience, systems thinking, and inner transformation for outer change. Beyond coaching and facilitating, she hosts ‘On Becoming the Change’ a podcast exploring personal growth as a catalyst for systemic transformation. She organises Mindful Nature Connection walks in Surrey, Mindfulness for Changemakers evenings in London and facilitates Conscious Evolution Collage workshops. With a decade of experience in sustainability—including roles at PwC and Oddbox—Heather integrates systems thinking, mindfulness, and coaching into her approach. She is an ICF-certified Transformative Coach, NLP practitioner, and trained Climate Change Coach. She is actively engaged in local climate initiatives, she helps organise The Great Big Green Week, Climate Cafés, and People, Planet, Pint events and is passionate about building community, deepening awareness and spending time in nature.
November 2025
Kids Go Wild!
10am-noon, Sunday 16th November
Forest School session with Charlotte Allchin
About the event:
A monthly fun-filled Forest School session led by qualified Forest School leader Charlotte Allchin in 55 acres of meadows and woodland. Suitable for all ages and whatever the weather – dress accordingly, it might get mucky! Varied activities outdoors in nature. One adult only may attend with each child or family group. Limited places. NB: All dates for 2025 now bookable.
December 2025
Kids Go Wild!
10am-noon, Sunday 14th December
Forest School session with Charlotte Allchin
About the event:
A monthly fun-filled Forest School session led by qualified Forest School leader Charlotte Allchin in 55 acres of meadows and woodland. Suitable for all ages and whatever the weather – dress accordingly, it might get mucky! Varied activities outdoors in nature. One adult only may attend with each child or family group. Limited places. NB: All dates for 2025 now bookable.