A Very 1920s Christmas at Lauriston Castle

A Very 1920s Christmas comes to Lauriston Castle on Saturday 12 December, a hands-on heritage workshop that takes the festive season back to its roots. The session is run by The Historical Herbalists CIC, who turn up in period costume as traditional healers and medical herbalists from the Romans to the modern era. They bring a background in the history of medicine, archaeology, social anthropology, botany, plant folklore and traditional crafts to the table, so the whole thing is built on more than just a bit of nostalgia.

The workshop traces how Christmas celebrations evolved from Tudor times through to the Jazz Age. You'll spend the session making three things: herbal bath salts inspired by vintage apothecary blends, fragrant mulled wine sachets, and a traditional mistletoe kissing bough. While you work, the room is filled with non-alcoholic warm mulled wine, mince pies and 1920s music. It's a slow, tactile way of spending a Saturday afternoon, and you leave with a few handmade things to take home.

Lauriston Castle itself fits the mood. It's a 16th-century tower house with Victorian extensions and early 20th-century interiors, set in gardens that stay open free to the public all year and look out across the Firth of Forth. The house and grounds hold collections left to the city by the castle's last residents, and this Christmas programme is led by the castle's own team, who've set out to strip away the commercialism of the season and get back to basics.

The session starts at 14:00 on Saturday 12 December at Lauriston Castle and Gardens, 2a Cramond Rd S, EH4 6AD. Tickets are £40 standard, with a non-refundable £2 transaction fee on all telephone and online bookings.