It’s coming back to me now. I remember this clearing in a forest in rural France. I recall the peace and quiet, broken only by the tapping of masons’ chisels. This time too, I can hear the clip-clop of a cart horse, the clang of a blacksmith’s hammer. There’s still no roar of diesel engines, no creaking of cranes – not even the buzz of a circular saw.
Some things have changed. I pass car parks full of retirees arriving on their day trips, school children streaming out of coaches. Back in 2001, it was more or less just me, in a quarry, chatting to a bunch of passionate but obsessed makers starting out on what seemed like a crazy and perhaps impossible dream: to build a full-scale 13th-century castle from scratch, using nothing more than the tools, techniques and resources of the time. Now, when I look up at the towering castle wall and turrets, it still seems outrageous, but they’ve proved it’s possible.
It could be the 13th century. But this is not a...