Harbour Road, Castletown, Caithness, KW14 8TG. Tel: 01847 821120 (unmanned - please leave a message) Opening hours Saturday, Sunday and Wednesday afternoons from 2pm to 4pm All year round (Except Christmas day and New Years Day) Other times by prior arrangement We look forward to seeing you! |
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Centre is fully accessible. Wheelchair available on request |
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Castlehill Heritage Centre is operated by Castletown Heritage Society as a visitor experience and educational resource. Themed exhibitions are held throughout the year featuring the history, heritage, biodiversity and social history of Castletown and the parish of Olrig. The Society also runs workshop and training days featuring local and vernacular skills such as rope making, wood chip carving, drystone dyking, croft crafts, limestone pointing and sea shore based crafts such as drift wood sculpture. |
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Castlehill Heritage Centre is located within renovated farm buildings immediately adjacent to the cutting yard and quarry of the now defunct flagstone workings. The workings were the first in the country to exploit the commercial possibilities of flagstone and in doing so put Castletown on the global map. The Castlehill Heritage Centre builds on our earlier achievements - visitors can walk round the Flagstone Heritage Trail which outlines the stages of the production of the stone, while an adjoining Sculpture Trail within the community woodland, demonstrates some artistic uses of the material. |
Castlehill Heritage CentreCastlehill Heritage Centre The buildings started life as a farm steading and dairy, dating back to the seventeenth century. Work to convert and bring them into service as a Heritage Centre has been undertaken in a staged manner as funding become available. A leaflet describing the buildings associated with the Traill family estate at Castlehill is available to download here. The first phase was to convert the old dairy at the north end of the building into a flexible 75mē exhibition area. Work started in earnest late 2006 with the commissioning of the building water supply, the closing off of redundant windows and doors and installation of a security system. In January 2007 work got underway to install a new ceiling, stud partitions, fire doors, plasterboard, insulation, exhibition lighting, power, data network, a basic galley kitchen and an underfloor heating system. The office and toilet facilities were also completed at this time.
All the work on phase one was undertaken by Society volunteers and reports on progress during the works can be seen on the NEWS pages. We are deeply indebted to UKAEA Dounreay who donated some materials which were salvaged from buildings demolished as part of the site decommissioning programme, including light fittings, fire doors, a fire alarm panel and an old conservatory.
The Archeological Research Facility comprises a receipt area where artefacts undergo wet sieving prior to being dried in the drying room and passing into the sorting, analysis and cataloguing area. The analysis room has a public viewing gallery and will also be linked to the website via a web cam in due course. In parallel with the internal works, a new access gate and footpath through the Heritage Garden has been created, linking visitors to the new main access door at the north end of the courtyard.
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Castletown Heritage is working closely with other agencies such as Scottish Natural Heritage who assisted us with the development of a heritage garden in the courtyard area, with local eco-culture themed beds featuring local crops, flora and artefacts, and the Scottish Community and Household Renewables Initiative (SCHRI) who assisted us to minimise our impact on the local environment through the use of renewable energy sources for space heating, domestic hot water and lighting as part of an environmentally sustainable facility. Click here for further details. Right: The Flower of Olrig - This is a drystone raised flower bed created by CHS members as part of their drystone dyking training. We felt we wanted to create something more than just a flower bed and the link to the sea/Castlehill harbour by creating a boat seemed obvious. |
From farm steading to Heritage Centre |
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Electricity and lights are go! Apr 06 Kitchen installation underway - Apr 07 The old coach house. Archive store and east end of exhibition building visible on right Work underway to create central features in the courtyard garden August 09 Entrance border beds in full bloom July 09 |
Lining and insulation of exhibition space underway - Jan 07 Operational! May 07 Feb 08 - The coach shed is now secure Clearing and levelling the ground to create safe and accessible walking areas Tidying of the courtyard heritage garden July 2010 |
Office nearing completion Courtyard in the raw - May 06 Doors Open Day, August 04 Finished entrance and disabled parking area August 09 Heritage Garden as viewed from the patio area at the west end Aug 10 |
Lining complete, lighting installed, floor down - Apr 07 New access path through the courtyard - October 07 Approach to Castlehill Heritage Centre - April 08 Raised bed featuring local herbs and vernacular plants HRH The Duke of Rothesay visits Castlehiull Heritage Centre August 10 |