A FILM made by teenagers who took part in a Big Brother-style time travel experiment at a North East castle has gone on show to visitors at a heritage museum.
Three months ago, 35 young volunteers spent five days locked away at remote Featherstone Castle in Northumberland, experiencing what life was like for their counterparts back in the 1840s.
Dressed in period costume for the duration of their stay, they had to survive without modern-day “essentials” such as their mobile phones, computers, TVs and fast food, as they were propelled back to early Victorian times.
The Heritage Big Brother project involved the group living, learning, entertaining themselves and even cooking according to the ways of the mid-19th Century, with heritage professionals and youth workers ensuring that the experience was as realistic and challenging as possible.
Cut off from the outside world, they made do without electricity, baked their own bread and prepared food from basic ingredients, as well as thinking up ways to keep themselves amused.
The only concession to modern times in the 1840s Big Brother house was that the youngsters had to use battery-operated candles for safety reasons.
The whole experience was captured on film by a crew of young people, and now the resulting fly-on-the-wall documentary footage has been made available for viewing at Woodhorn Museum, near Ashington.
Heritage Big Brother was organised by Woodhorn and the Northumberland Youth Service, after being inspired by a time travel idea from a group of young people in Ashington.
Juliet Hardy, a creative mentor based at Woodhorn, was one of the key figures in bringing the whole thing together. Yesterday she said: ”It was very exciting to see the young peoples’ ideas develop into a living reality.
“They brought an amazing energy to the project and it was so rewarding to witness. I was nervous about how they’d actually cope with the challenges of the week, without a mobile phone, television or computer. However, in spite of our concerns, I think everyone found it an extremely rewarding project.
“I’m sure many people will now enjoy watching the film, which is both thought-provoking and entertaining, and finding out more about how the young people dealt with the challenges.”
Youth worker Ashley Brown: ”In the space of five days we saw young people develop and be incredibly articulate, skilful, committed and resourceful.”
Teenager Rebecca Flynn, who was one of the 35 housemates, said: ”The main thing about this experience was learning and enjoying yourselves. The thing I will take away from the week will be trying to take less things for granted now, and spend more time with my family.
“It was really nice just sitting down and eating with other people and talking.”
The Heritage Big Brother film will be on show at Woodhorn until the end of this month.