ancient technology centre Craft courses and workshops 2025
Our Mission
At the Ancient Technology Centre we work hard to provide a range of heritage craft courses from a number of skilled tutors.
Our 2024 season included Medieval Illuminations, willow basketry, Prehistoric pottery, Celtic woodcarving, Bronze Age basketry, Stone-Age Amber jewellery, Roman Knife Making, Viking Deer Butchery, Sprang and Cooking Like A Viking.
Our 2025 season includes our regular heritage crafters and some extra-special whole-weekend crafting events.
Our partners in heritage skills events 2025:
Heritage Skills craft weekend 10th & 11th May 2025
In a change to the previous advertised course weekend The Ancient Technology Centre are hosting the following artisan craftspeople for a weekend of workshops:
Sarah Day, Memma the Cavewoman, hosts 2 days of flint knapping workshops.
Saturday 10th May 2025: Working with larger flint spalls or small nodules to create hand axe tools. Learning how to shape flint and use historic methods to create Stone Age tools.
Sunday 11th May 2025: Working with smaller flakes to create flint arrowheads. Pressure flaking and more advanced flint knapping techniques.
More details and book flint knapping by following this LINK.
Fergus Milton with "Alchemy at the Ancient Technology Centre"
With over 23 years experience in Metallurgy and time demonstrating with the Ancient Wessex Network, Fergus is your tutor for two unique metal working days:
Saturday 10th May - Turning rock into Metal – £100
Spend a magical day learning how our ancestors of the Bronze Age first started changing rocks into metal and set us on the path to the world we know today.
Sunday 11th May - Ancient Bronze Casting basics – £140
This workshop is aimed at people who want to explore the magic of bronze casting but don’t know where to start and for people who have lots of questions and want to explore the process.
Working with the materials and techniques of the Bronze Age, moulds made of clay, cuttlefish and lost-wax will be prepared during the morning before attempting to cast them in the afternoon.
Conditions
The minimum age 18. Suitable dress code required. For more details contact Fergus HERE.
Jenny Heath, Drakos Dottir Viking textile trader:
Saturday 10th May 2025: An introduction to tablet weaving. - £65
Learn the history of tablet weaving with a focus on its use in the Viking Age. Use wooden tablets to string up a pattern and weave a historic design. You will be able to take your woven band home with you to finish.
More details and booking tablet weaving by following this LINK.
Heritage Textiles Weekend 7th & 8th June 2024
Join our Castle Hill Heritage Skills CIC expert tutors who will teach you four heritage textile crafts over the course of the weekend.
Sally Pointer - Sally Pointer Heritage Education
Vanessa Bunton -Puku B Historic Experiences
Jalea Ward - Slightly Warped Looms
Jenny Heath - Drakos Dottir Viking Textiles
You will have 4 sessions over the mornings and afternoons of both Saturday 7th June and Sunday 8th June 2025.
These will all be in a heritage textile skill such as:
- Twining
- Loom weaving
- Stone Age sewing kit
- Natural Dyeing
Tickets are £215.00 for the weekend tutoring and evening talk. The ticket price includes a unique bag full of all the supplies needed for the workshops, a collection of resources unavailable as a package anywhere else. You will have around 2 and a half hours with each textile skill and tutor to learn the history and have a go yourself. On the Saturday evening we will gather for a communal meal (additional fee TBC).
As a late addition bonus we have an amazing guest speaker for Saturday night. Nicole DeRushie, academic, experimental archaeologist and Bronze Age clothing specialist will deliver a talk on Saturday night for course attendees.
Deer butchery and using the whole animal 10th & 11th October 2025
Join Castle Hill Heritage Skills expert tutors for whole weekend of Deer butchery and using the whole animal using prehistoric tools and methods.
Learn to make tools and cook the Stone Age way!
Our experts are:
- Sarah Day and associates: Memma the Cave Woman and Prehistoric Experiences Stone Age school visits.
You will have 4 sessions over the mornings and afternoons of both Saturday 11th October and Sunday 12th October 2025. These will involve using Stone Age tools and methods to butcher a deer. You will tan skins and use parts of the animal for cordage and tools. You will also cook and preserve parts of the deer in Stone Age methods and recipes.
Weekend structure:
- Skinning and butchery. You will work on a deer to learn how to butcher for meat, skins and tools.
- Basic tanning. Using skins in various stages of the tanning process you will learn how to preserve a skin and turn it into leathers.
- Bones and antlers and tendons. Using parts of the animal to create tools and cordage.
- Stone Age cooking. Using a fire pit over and some foraged plants you will create a range of dishes to enjoy with your fellow attendees.
Tickets are £215.00 for the weekend tutoring and evening talk. You will have around 2 and a half hours with each skill and tutor to learn the history and have a go yourself. On the Saturday evening we will gather for a communal meal (additional fee TBC) and an evening talk led by our expert tutors.
our heritage skills partners
Castle Hill Heritage Skills CIC
Our partners at Castle Hill Heritage Skills CIC hire the Ancient Technology Centre site to run heritage experiences.
As a not-for-profit company all profit from Castle Hill Heritage Skills CIC events goes straight into the ongoing maintenance and reconstruction of buildings at the Ancient Technology Centre. This is such a special and unique site we hope to help preserve it for future generations to visit.