Join us on the Sheep’s Head peninsula for the West Cork Stone Symposium 2019 (22nd-24th March)!
Our intriguing programme is packed with opportunities for you to work alongside amazing craftspeople, acquiring skills that have been passed down from generation to generation.
Talks by archaeologists and sculptors, as well as demonstrations by carvers and blacksmiths, will be on offer during the weekend too. And there’s great music and craic to be found in the village pubs each evening!
Tickets for individual dry stone walling workshops and stone carving workshops, as well as other events, are available in our online shop. Workshops run in parallel each day. You can download the programme here.
Friday 22nd March 2019
Dry Stone Walling Workshop | Buy single day tickets (€60) | Buy multi-day tickets| 9:30am-4:30pm (Durrus).
Stone Carving Workshop | Buy single day tickets (€70) | Buy multi-day tickets | 9:30am-4:30pm (Durrus)
Visit Durrus Cheese
FOOD EVENT | Sarah Hennessy | Durrus Cheese Dairy, Coomkeen, 10:30am-12pm |Buy ticket (€10) Booking Essential
Durrus is home to one of Ireland’s most famous and tastiest farmhouse cheeses. Visit the dairy in Coomkeen to see cheese being made. You’ll learn about how place, sea air, and a family business create distinctive and award-winning flavours here on the Sheep’s Head peninsula. And of course you’ll get to taste Durrus too!
Uncovering the Past: Unearthing a 5,00-year-old Passage Tomb
TALK | Dr. Clíodhna Ní Lionáin | Philips’ Green Centre, Durrus, 5:30pm |€5 on the door (free to workshop attendees)
Dr Clíodhna Ní Lionáin of University College, Dublin – a familiar face at the West Cork Stone Symposium! – will talk about the fascinating process of uncovering a 5,500-year-old passage tomb at Dowth Hall in the heart of the Brú na Bóinne World Heritage site in Co Meath.
Saturday 23rd March 2019
Dry Stone Walling Workshop | Buy single day tickets (€60) | Buy multi-day tickets | 9:30am-4:30pm (Durrus)
Stone Carving Workshop| Buy single day tickets (€70) | Buy multi-day tickets | 9:30am-4:30pm (Durrus)
Watch a Blacksmith at Work
DEMONSTRATION |JJ Bowen | Outside Philips’ Green Centre, Durrus | Time TBC
The acclaimed Sheep’s Head blacksmith JJ Bowen will show us how he makes chisels and other items using traditional blacksmithing skills.
Guided Walk (Sheep’s Head Way)
Details tbc.
Sculpting the Sculptor: Creating a Bust of Seamus Murphy
TALK | Nigel Baxter | Philips’ Green Centre, Durrus, 5:30pm |€5 on the door (free to workshop attendees)
The English sculptor Nigel Baxter will talk about his project to create a stone bust in tribute to the sculptor Seamus Murphy – a homage to the Cork craftsman and his legacy. The crowd-funded project, which saw Nigel work on the bust in the Crawford Gallery in Cork, is a wonderful testament to the traditions and connections that link generations of people who create with stone.
Sunday 24th March 2019
Dry Stone Walling Workshop | Buy single day tickets €60 | Buy multi-day tickets | 9:30am-4:30pm. (Durrus)
Stone Carving Workshop | Buy single day tickets | Buy multi-day tickets 9:30am-4:30pm (Durrus)
Sacred Stones and the Cult of Sun Worship
TALK | Professor William O’Brien|€10| Buy tickets [limited availability – booking essential] | 3pm-5pm (Ballycommane House)
Professor William O’Brien of University College Cork will give an open-air talk at Ballycommane, just outside Durrus, to explain the story and significance of its boulder-burial site and pair of standing stones.
Check out details of great places to stay, places to eat, walks and other activities on the website of our award-winning local tourism co-op!