Emma Hamilton, Events Co-Ordinator and Admin Assistant

This month marks a year since I joined the team at Balcaskie, taking on the role of Events Coordinator and Admin Assistant here on the Estate. Having grown up surrounded by food and farming by entire life, with both sides of my family being farming families, a career with fields at foot was always on the cards.

Over the past year I have learnt the ins and outs of running our monthly markets at Bowhouse, become an expert at pushing stuck cars, gained my personal licence, aced my skills as a fork-lift driver, and even given our bulls a bath ahead of show season. I can for sure say that my job title does not suggest half of the jobs I find myself doing, which is what I love about it.

Bowhouse is the home of expert producers and creators, so my goal for this year is to bring more exciting, educational experiences to our Courtyard Classroom. People want to learn new skills, and what better place to learn those skills than Bowhouse? Already we have seen the introduction of embroidery classes, miso masterclasses and pasta making mornings. To that, I hope to add rural skills classes across the wider estate to bring education, additional knowledge and specialist expertise to this corner of the world.

 

In my quest to broaden my own network and knowledge, Kylie and I had the opportunity to attend the Farm Retail Conference down in Harrogate at the beginning of March with the aim of bringing back lots of fresh ideas to bring to Bowhouse. Our trip began with a visit to Malton, a small town about an hour from Harrogate, known for its vibrant culinary scene, artisan producers and popular annual food festival. A particularly unusual find was their very traditional, old school style town centre mart which closely rubs its shoulders with the neighbouring activities in the town. Keeping the local, ‘tight knit’ community feel, the town looks not too dissimilar to how it did 100 years ago.

The next day we took a trip to Farmer Copley’s, an award winning, family run farm shop and destination in West Yorkshire. They are well known for their large-scale seasonal events, onsite butchery and bakery. To say I was blown away is an understatement. The scale they have reached through their diversification scheme is something to admire. From tulip and pumpkin festivals, vintage car rally’s, gelato parlour, an onsite butchery and events space. Catering to an abundance of backgrounds, with some serious market research, there really is something for everyone.

Before heading home, we decided to head west and visit The Courtyard Dairy and Wensleydale Creamery. As we embarked on our journey, the weather was somewhat turbulent, but nevertheless we set off in the direction of the Yorkshire Dales. We had a pit stop at The Courtyard Dairy, where we found a specialist cheese shop, bakery and pizzeria (a must try!). After overindulging in pizza and freshly baked sweet treats, we continued our journey North, next stop – Wensleydale Creamery, the home of Wallace and Gromit. We learned about the history of Wensleydale and the history and process of making cheese. Fun fact – rennet, the coagulating enzyme which turns the milk to curds is commonly found in the 4^th stomach of a cow… or boiled snails!

The weather took a turn for the worse, despite this, we did try and take in the scenery of the Yorkshire Dales through the rain, hail and… falling branches. Even though we battled our way through the deep “puddles”, which we thought we had seen the back of, we then faced a blocked road due to one of those trusty electric cars. We had no option but to turn back the way we came. We did eventually make is back to Scotland!

My North Yorkshire trip has given me plenty of inspiration, particularly from our visit to Farmer Copley’s, which I can hopefully translate into successful events that fit our ethos at Bowhouse. The goal isn’t to copy—it’s to spot patterns behind the success and apply them in a way that fits our space.

Reflecting back over this past year, it has been one of the fastest years of my life, and I can’t wait to see what the next one brings.