The Kimberley City Bakery Medieval festival celebrated its fourth and final year this year, while also announcing some exciting news for the future of the festival.
On Sunday, July 15, 2018, Bakery Owners Michelle and Eric Forbes announced that Jen Silverhorse and Sandy Poxon have taken over the Kimberley Medieval Festival, and hope to create a year-round, historically accurate Medieval town in the area.
The two have been part of the Medieval circuit in western Canada for many years, and are the driving force behind the Alberta Medieval Settlement, a project in conjunction with the University of Calgary to create a historically accurate Medieval town, as it would have been in England in the year 1450.
“They have been working with a team of specialists, procuring grants, and when it is complete, plan to have around 80 people living on the site year-round for a fully functional medieval village,” the Forbes’ explained in a press release.
Their plan is to also do the same here in Kimberley.
“While continuing to bring the Kimberley Medieval Festival to Kimberley each year, they are planning to create a full Viking village in the area as well,” says the family. “While Silverhorse and Poxon oversee the projects, they are working with a team that focuses solely on the Medieval Settlement, and one that will focus on The RavenStone Project - the Viking village.”
They have already started working with Columbia Basin Trust, Tourism BC, Community Futures, and local, provincial, and federal governments to raise funds for this project, and try to find the ideal plot of land. They are looking for land in Kimberley, Cranbrook, or the RDEK in the area, and trying to work with chambers and local governments to find the best fit for the project, which will be a year round source of tourism and education, with plans for around 50 people to live onsite to help run the village, farm the land, raise animals, work with metal and silver smithing, weaving, sewing, and making food, the way it would have been done during the Viking age.
“While local schools will be able to visit the village and learn about Viking times, the plan is also to take the re-enactors from the village to other schools around BC, to bring the experience as far as the lower mainland. They have chosen the Kimberley/Cranbrook Corridor as the ideal location, in part due to the landscape similarities with some of the inland areas where the Vikings settled,” adds the Forbes.
“The Kimberley Medieval Festival is planned to continue as it has been over the last four years, implementing a nominal cost to help provide working capital to start building the village, while keeping the festival’s focus on Vikings, as it has been from the first year, and working to keep making the festival bigger and better, while creating a lasting legacy here in the Kootenays that will be a year round tourism attraction from the humble beginnings of a Medieval Festival that wanted to bring something different to Kimberley, and an event for families to enjoy together, from the smallest to the oldest, with something for everyone.”
