About Pendragon
Our Purpose
The Pendragon Foundation is a volunteer-powered charity dedicated to restoring and revitalizing castles across the British Isles. Founded in March 2025, we’re combining a fresh strategic approach with the latest technologies to develop a new approach to sustaining Britain’s heritage, one that’s adapted to the changing and challenging circumstances of the 21st century. We want to see our castles and communities thriving and we believe that the castles we restore will be catalysts for long-term regeneration.
The Problem
Castles are our history in stone. From Roman walls, Saxon forts, Norman castles to Tudor bastions, these gigantic fortifications have towered over the British landscape for centuries. Their walls have been symbols of conquest, power and authority. Their keeps have been places of sanctuary, safety and security. For hundreds of years, people from all walks of life lived worked in these ancient structures, their daily lives intertwined with the places they ate, toiled, played and slept. Their silent battlements remain scarred by the lives they saw, the sieges they endured, the heroism and betrayal they witnessed. They remain an enduring testament to the world our ancestors built.
Their mighty ramparts inspire the imagination, and they have become a key fixture in Britain’s history and mythology. Arguably the most famous castle is Camelot, the residence of the legendary King Arthur Pendragon (from whom our foundation gets its name) and the Knights of the Round Table. Camelot was a golden ideal, a stronghold of justice, chivalry and glory. Its design was strong and beautiful, an emblem of all that was good in this sceptred isle. The stories tell us that though Camelot is now fallen into decay, it will be restored once more when Arthur returns when Britain needs him most.
Our precious and magnificent heritage is now at great risk. Traditional funding models and ways of operating are proving ineffectual and unsustainable in a context of rising costs and changes in British culture. Many of the organisations who have overseen Britain’s heritage sector are having to downsize their workforce and reduce expenditure as their income from tourism is in sharp decline. Sadly, this may lead to a rise in historic buildings that are at risk. With further instability in the sector expected, these trends look set to only get worse.
Our Solution
Pendragon is addressing these challenges by taking a bold and fresh approach to castle restoration. We believe that the best way to secure the long-term future of our heritage is by identifying new ways of funding these projects, developing a volunteer network and by reimagining their post-restoration lives.
Our funding will be raised primarily through crowdfunding campaigns for the restoration of specific sites. This approach has been employed successfully in France to raise 11 million euros restore 3 castles. We believe this model can be adapted to a British context. We believe it will thereby free our restoration efforts from the volatility of government funding while fostering mass participation in the maintenance in our nation’s heritage.
Volunteers are at the heart of our organisation. We are developing a network of passionate people committed to rebuilding Britain’s strongholds. We empower individuals and groups to develop their skills and to contribute to the project in ways they enjoy, thereby creating a widespread, capable and dynamic network. In this way, we can grow our movement organically, enabling a vibrant and proactive response to local and national possibilities.
Castles must become catalysts of cultural, economic and social regeneration. In the medieval era, castles were the centre of communal life. Poets and musicians entertained in a court while craftsmen and artisans made and sold their wares. We believe historic buildings must play a similar role today. They must become an integral part of local life, supplying services that are needed by groups and businesses. In this way, they will generate a secure income, support local activities and become more fully relevant in the lives of the people who live nearby them.
We want to embrace the unique opportunities that each castle and its surroundings bring in our restoration work. For some, that will be by turning them into living museums, tourist attractions with jousting and archery, medieval crafts and historical festivals. Others will have a different path, supporting businesses like breweries, farming, fishing, bee keeping, hospitality, events, renewable energies, art galleries, cultural activities and more. In determining a castle’s future, we take a creative approach that respects the property’s heritage and fully collaborates with local people to deliver a living castle that places the castle and its future at the heart of communal life.
Our Values
In everything we do, the Pendragon Foundation is guided by three values:
- Innovation. We embrace new, effective ways of working to adapt and master a changing landscape of possibilities.
- Responsibility. Restoring a castle is a privilege that must be undertaken with serious endeavour and respect for tradition. It also involves honesty and openness with our partners and donors
- The Common Good. Our efforts must be directed towards benefiting local communities and national groups. We want our restored castles to play a positive role in the regeneration of regional and national life.