We hope you, family and colleagues are all well. To those of you that have also lost close ones - my condolences. To those of you that have caught this virus and survived - thank goodness you're strong. For those of you that haven't seen your family and pals - it'll hopefully not be too long now. For those of you that have lost your businesses and jobs or missed out on further education we really sympathise - stay positive ! 
Well here we go again.  It's looking like end of April being the first of our courses. We feel as though we're stuck in a loop now, but will give this another shot at trying to reorganise all your course dates. We are missing the contact and want to give you such a good day or weekend with us. It took some amount of juggling last year to get this done so here goes. 
We've notified all those 200 + folks we had to postpone from first and second lockdowns - there are however a few gaps and spaces still available for 2021. Have a look at the dates available here and get yourself booked up. We have accommodation providers, pubs, restaurants shops and others waiting to see you as well. Help us all get kick started and have a great time with us doing it !!

We're getting back into it slowly- having rearranged a lot of course dates for this back end of the year we've had the inevitable batch cancellations with new tier systems being introduced. However better safe than sorry. HAd a hardy bunch of folks out this autumn with the wettest spell of weather as well. All producing amazing work. Well done everyone. New course dates for 2021 are up on the website.

Over the course of the past few months I have been thinking more about how we fit as a species in the ancient landscape and how the wooded landscape in particular has been the home for a prehistoric people that lived there. In the absence of any great cave painting sites in Northern Britain and very few primitive art objects and carvings being found in the archaeological record, I have made some of my own. I am absolutely convinced that 3,000 plus years ago we would have had a rich gallery of open air and portable artworks created. This new Northlands work is an extension of my earlier Kilmartin Series. Still influenced by the cup and ring marks of Argyll, Tayside and Northumberland, still inspired by the artworks of neolithic burial chambers in Ireland and always aware of the amazing pictograms of Scandinavia and Northern Spain - this is my response. 

A Big Tree respect for the folks attending today’s workshop helping us get the post lockdown etiquette and guidelines in place. Couldn’t be more grateful for you guys waiting patiently for the rescheduling slots. Thanks !! Big Tree it up for six fantastic makers Kate, Eli, Sam, Giordana, Anthony and Martine you were great company.

What a difference a year makes ! We’re pleased to have restarted the courses again. Thanks to great participants in the past two weeks we’ve made things safely. So here’s just a few smiling faces from last year. Let’s hope we can keep the good times going.
We’re slowly getting folks who have been put on hold this summer rebooked onto new dates. It’ll take a while to clear the 200 bookings but we’ll do it.
Keep safe everyone - and oh yes thanks for all the supportive messages and empathy - means so much to us during these strange times.

http://www.thebigtreesociety.co.uk/whats-happening/summer-time-is-coming

I once read in an old account by Sir Archibald Geikie in his great tome “The Scenery of Scotland” 1901 that the Scots were a “product of their landscape”. In some respects it’s true - the crag, the hill, the shore, the glen, the merse, the machair, the big sky and the endless sea. These elements may well mould and form behaviour and character.
I’ve always felt connected to my land, my coast and my past. These artworks are my response to things ancient, to connections and signs from long ago before.

A Big Tree welcome back to the new order and a Big Tree thank you to our first stool making course attendees Jim, Shaun, Willie, Gavin, John and Murdo. Thanks lads for making it such a great day. Stay safe guys. See some of you back quite soon.

Thank you for being so patient and understanding during this crisis. It's been tough for most and heart breaking for others. Our sympathies and thoughts with all of you that have lost family or friends through this virus. We are still awaiting the green light here in the Borders to be able to proceed and open up the gallery and courtyard workshop area. We've been fortunate to live in a rural area that has not been affected too greatly by cases. We want to keep it that way ! To this end we have decided to begin very tentatively with reduced number courses. We propose to attempt the following as from and inclusive of August 29th 2020.

For those of you that have been unable to attend and still want to come on a course we propose to :

• reschedule you into new dates in 2020 and 2021 on FRIDAY or SUNDAYS for the one day courses such as stool making, spoon, treen and bird carving, polelathe turning, sitooterie and woodprint making. These will have to take place on a Friday as we have no other days free this year due to the courses being fully booked til Xmas
• for those booked onto weekend courses such as chair making, shave horse construction and stone lettering we will have set specific dates for these but will have to run into the winter months of Jan and Feb 2021
• they will be allocated on a first to respond basis with no changes or cancellations being made once you have confirmed a date. You might be disappointed not to get the date you want - but you'll at least attend a course.
• this might take some time to run through til everyone has been reallocated. Some of you will have accommodation re-booking to do so that's going to be tricky as well.

We have to do it this way. If we shifted everyone across into next year we lose a whole year trading and no time or dates will be available for new attendees. Therefore we will have no income at all in 2020. The workshop and gallery are going through a different set of unlocking issues and may take a lot longer to regroup and recover.

Refunding postponed courses is not possible. Those of you who no longer wish to or won't be able to attend will have their course fees used to pay for all the materials, tooling, external tutor time, rent, insurance, utility costs etc that we have had to pay over past few months. We are sure you will all understand. We will start to reschedule folks in as from 8th August. So watch out for an email from us soon.


Thanks - Eoin Big Tree Person