Tempest, Tides & Timbers

Working in collaboration with renowned Hastings’ practitioners Heather and Keith Leech, and their company, Gleowit Productions we will produce a spectacular re-enactment of the beaching of the Amsterdam.

We will evoke the ghost of an 18th century ship sunk beneath shingle on Bulverhythe Beach in a large-scale performance.

We will bring our combined expertise in creating community celebrations together with the willingness of local people to participate in them to raise awareness of the impending loss of a significant part of our heritage to rising sea levels.

The ship beached at exactly the point where the sea is certain to re-enter the Combe Valley within a quarter of a century, 300 years after she was beached. It was then an estuary and a couple of hundred years earlier a harbour.

We are using the site of the Amsterdam – buried on top of a primordial forest and next to dinosaur footprints – and the story of its destruction in a storm, to highlight the current environmental threats posed to our coastline by climate change and rising sea levels.

MSL has created an AV work, with sound and visual artists and professional performers working with participants from the Seaview Project. A concept trailer of this can be viewed below.

Tempest, Tides and Timbers is a first step to delivery of a further ambitious work in September 2025 called Looking for Bo Peep.

Gleowit will expand this into a performance engaging over 100 people. Inspired by Chaucer’s, The Canterbury Tales, our characters are drawn from our coastal heritage and landscape.

We are looking for people who would like to be involved as performers or musicians. If you would like to take part, please email projects@mslprojects.co.uk.