The Castle Series

Exploring castles, landscapes, and the future of heritage

The Castle Series is an ongoing body of writing and field notes exploring castles and historic sites across the UK, not as tourist attractions, but as places shaped by memory, landscape, power, and possibility.

Each piece is written shortly after visiting a site, capturing first impressions, observations, and questions while they are still fresh. Sometimes this includes photography, short films, or experimental media; sometimes it is simply writing.

What matters most is the act of being there, and thinking about what these places still mean today.

Mont-Saint-Michel, featured in the series

SERIES

What this series explores

The Castle Series sits at the intersection of heritage, place, and creative technology. Across the entries, you’ll find reflections on:

Castles as lived landscapes, not just monuments.
Access, interpretation, and who heritage is really for.
How digital and immersive tools might deepen connection to place.
The relationship between historic sites and local communities.
What is present, what is missing, and what is fading.

This is not a guidebook, a review series, or a catalogue of facts.
It is closer to a notebook, part travel writing, part research journal, part creative exploration.

How the writing works

Each entry is shaped by a simple constraint: write within 60–90 minutes of leaving the site.

That limit keeps the work grounded in experience rather than hindsight. Some posts are more visual, others more reflective. Not every visit involves drones, scans, or finished films, and that’s intentional.

The entries

Below is a growing collection of Castle Series writing, presented in chronological order of publication.

Interpretation board showing the history of St Wilfrid’s Church and Mab’s Cross in Standish, Wigan

Wigan local history, exploring Standish and history hiding in plain sight

A reflective walk through Wigan and Standish, exploring churches, monuments, and overlooked stories, from St Wilfrid’s Church to Mab’s Cross, and asking how historic places can reconnect with modern communities.

AVimmerse

Why this series exists

Castles often sit at the centre of our towns and landscapes, yet remain strangely distant — fenced, narrated, flattened into timelines.

This series asks quieter questions:

What does it feel like to arrive here today?
Who feels welcome, and who doesn’t?
How might technology help us listen more carefully, rather than shout louder?

Over time, this writing will inform longer-form projects, including digital trails, immersive heritage work, and future publications, but for now, it begins with attention and presence.

This work also feeds into teaching, research-adjacent and public engagement conversations, including collaboration with universities where appropriate.

Follow the series

If you’d like to receive occasional updates when new Castle Series entries are published, you’re welcome to subscribe.

Subscribe Here.

The Castle Series is part of the wider AVimmerse exploration into immersive heritage, place-based storytelling, and creative technology.

Interested in the Castle Series?

If you’re a heritage organisation, local group, researcher, or simply curious about uncovering hidden castle stories, we’d love to hear from you.

👉 Get in touch to talk about a site, story, or collaboration