The Good Life France Magazine January/February 2015 | Page 17

You only have to look at the #SecretsoftheCastle Twitter hashtag to discover how the amazing story has left people wanting to swap places with the three BBC stars and try stepping back in time for themselves.

The Castle of Guédelon is a “follie”, the idea of local French chateau restorer and owner Michel Guyot. He and his brother Jacques have a passion for historic buildings and cut their teeth restoring an abandoned and almost derelict chateau with huge success. The work inspired in him a passion to learn more about building a castle from scratch.

So where do you start when you want to build a 13th Century chateau just as it would have been done 800 years ago?

I spoke to Sarah Preston from Bath, UK who worked as a guide at Guédelon and is now the press officer.

“Materially” says Sarah “the first challenge was raising enough funds to get the project off the ground. Funding a suitable site was crucial, as well as finding the raw materials required in the construction. We were fortunate to find an abandoned quarry, which as well as having the largest deposit of sandstone in the area, was also surrounded by oak forests, and had rich supplies of sand and clay”.

From those humble beginnings in 1997 has grown a most magnificent undertaking. One that has seen a growing number of keen volunteers join the paid members of staff over the years. They are united by their passion for this huge adventure, the chance to learn about old technicques of building and living in way that’s never been tried before now.

Recently featured in a BBC series called Secrets of the Castle, the Guédelon Castle endeavour has enthralled the British public as historian Ruth Goodman and archaeologists Peter Ginn and Tom Pinfold turned the clock back to join workers and volunteers on site to learn the skills of medieval castle builders.

“It will take our team at least 25 years to complete the castle"