The 30 acre Novers Limeworks is a regenerated ancient woodland that contains a varied topography and land cover which provides a proven venue for a range of educational activities. Overall the woodland is managed as a maximum biodiversity wild-wood with part restored into a coppice cycle. Within it is being developed a one acre permaculture forest garden. This will be designed to provide foraging opportunities for as wide a range of native wild food plants as possible. Overall the woodland will be managed as a sustainable woodland which when fully developed will enable visitors to explore how people have lived within the landscape for the last 10,000 years, first as hunter-gatherers, then farmers and more recently as industrialists. To date a Mesolithic encampment has been built and used for field courses. The IA style round-house will be the focus for an early agriculturalist zone. The wall structure is in place, built by volunteers, the roof structure requires some professional aid.
The Novers Limeworks forest is a secret and magical green space and nationally important industrial archaeological site, designated SAM, that was saved from clear felling by a local charitable trust TCHT in 2010. Over the last years a car park has been built, old trackways restored and the woodland brought slowly back into management, as a sustainable forest by a small band of dedicated volunteers. Over the last two years community and educational use has been developed which has included wildlife and archaeological studies, the development of a sustainable charcoal coppice and camp and in 2014 the building of a Mesolithic hunter gatherer camp site, in which groups of young people have been able to experience how people lived in the distant past. The large 10m diameter round-house was planned and commenced to provide an all weather teaching space within the woodland. Help is needed to complete the build which when finished will provide a central focus for the whole of the 30 acre site
The Novers Limeworks Forest project offers a unique vision of how a past industrial site, a scheduled ancient monument of national importance, can become a self sustaining community valued green space and educational resource. Providing interpretation and practical experience of the heritage of the site within its landscape context. Providing a productive and sustainable forest with increased biodiversity and public access.