Four Quarter Days
2025
Bealtaine - May 2025
For Bealtaine or May, we celebrate the return of summer, of green growth and flowers. Lá Bealtaine or May Day heralds the bright half of the year, when farmers historically walked their land boundaries, and when animals went out to pasture. It was a time of great power, a seedbed of superstition with potential for both good luck and bad luck. In Irish tradition, this was the time when the half-yearly tenants’ rent was paid to the farm to the landowners. It was usually a very lean time before the first harvests.
It is time to acknowledge the renewal of the land, and the abundance of the coming summer and what that means to us. We’ll wash our faces in the morning dew, light fires and explore the folklore that brings good luck to all of us.
Our weaving focus will be on the use of willow bark which we’ll extract from our own living willow. We’ll make willow utensils to eat with. We’ll learn how to cleave or split willow.
We'll forage for plant material with a specific focus on the verdant yellows and greens of this time. We’ll look at processes to extract colour and use a variety of binders and natural preservatives to create a beautiful palette of Bealtaine.
BOOK OUR BEALTAINE RETREAT HERE
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‘She turned to the sunlight and shook her yellow head.
And whispered to her neighbour ‘Winter is dead’.
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Samhain - October 2025
Samhain is the name of the feast when the Celts celebrated their new year. The light is dying, and darkness has the upper hand. It's a time to acknowledge the coming of winter and the stillness. Like Mayday, it was historically a time when the half-yearly rent would have to be paid for tenant farmers. Unlike May Day it was a time when the stores were full and the work was done; it was therefore a time for playfulness, meeting the other world with lightness and fun. It’s a time to remember those no longer with us.
We'll focus on Rush plaiting. We’ll take a slow, gentle and rhythmic approach to plaiting using different number of elements. We’ll coil and sew our plaits into mats and small baskets for our feast.
We’ll create a palette of greys and blacks, by processing oak galls and acorns and by charring. We’ll make charcoal and use this to create a range of black and grey tones.
We'll forage for mushrooms with our local expert and explore the use of mushrooms in dyeing, mordanting and printing. We'll examine the role of divination or divining and see which parts of that have continued into modern life.
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‘Dá fhada an lá tagann an tráthnóna’.
No matter how long the day, the evening comes.
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2026
Imbolc - February 2026
‘I mBolc’ literally means ‘in the belly’. A time of fertility and gestation before a slow bursting into bud. This is the time of cleansing and revitalising before the slow unfurling of spring. I was brought up to acknowledge 1st February or St Brigit’s Day as the first day of spring.
Generally, this is an indoor feast where rushes are woven into crosses and small baskets and rushes are also strewn on the floor. The most important use of rushes was for light, and that was made from a stripped rush dipped in tallow. We’ll light fires.
We’ll explore Earth pigments and the folklore associated with earth and iron. We’ll examine some simple recipes for making a range of iron oxide pigments. We’ll examine the roots of madder and a palate of yellows.
Our material focus will be on Rush and Juncus and the ancient techniques associated with it. We’ll make cordage, weave St. Brigits crosses, plait St Brigit’s girdles and make small rush pouches. We’ll also spend one morning on the willow bed harvest, and celebrating the ‘boon’ when neighbours would come together to help each other with this task.
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‘If I knew you were coming, I'd shake green rushes for you.’
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Lùnasa - August 2026
Lùnasa is the most communal of seasons celebrated around the end of July and the beginning of August. It was historically a time for dancing and sport when the harvest was complete and when people really felt like they could really let their hair down. It was the high point of the summer. Ritual celebrations marked the first sheaf cut or the last sheaf cut.
Our material focus during this retreat will be straw. We'll work with oats, wheat and rye and examine the quality and uses of each. We'll weave harvest knots and plait corn dollies, a tradition which was popular all over Europe.
Our colour focus will be Woad, which we’ll harvest and prepare from our garden. We'll make ink and dye. Woad (Isatis tinctoria) is a biennial plant which grows happily in Northern Europe and was used as an alternative to Indigo until the 16th century when indigo was imported. In its first year, the leaves are harvested and used to make a dye vat. In the second year it flowers and produces seeds.
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‘The wheel has turned once more
The first Harvest is at our door'
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