Our latest annual report charts an eventful 40th year for The Sharpham Trust: in 2022 we opened a new retreat centre - but another of our venues was destroyed by fire.
There was a happy end to the loss of The Kuti - our solo retreat space. Our friends, subscribers and supporters pulled together and donated to our Crowdfunder appeal, enabling the construction of The Hermitage.
Despite this dramatic beginning to the 2022-23 financial year, this, our birthday year, was positive in lots of ways.
Our rewilding project Wild For People (which has National Lottery funding) continued, ensuring more birds - including a field-hunting heron - insects, invertebrates and small mammals could share The Sharpham Estate with we humans.
Because of our birthday, we decided to offer 40 retreat bursary spaces to people of low income who would not normally be able to pay for a retreat at Sharpham.
In this year our new Sharpham House garden team - including BBC Gardeners' World presenter Frances! - battled drought conditions that turned our lawns brown (but helped our tomatoes and cucumbers). Barn gardener Luci created a new Mediterranean area whilst uncovering an ancient trough.
Mindfulness retreatants and newsbrands continued to give rave reviews of retreats at Sharpham, supporting us in our mission to make a more mindful, compassionate and environmentally-sustainable world.
