About
Acton Scott Working Farm Museum is a living museum of Victorian agriculture set in the beautiful South Shropshire hills, where traditional farming methods are demonstrated daily using the techniques, tools, and animal breeds that would have been familiar to a Shropshire farmer in the late nineteenth century. The farm occupies a site on the Acton Scott estate near Church Stretton, surrounded by some of the finest landscape in the Welsh Marches — the rolling hills of the Long Mynd and Wenlock Edge providing a spectacular backdrop to a museum that is as much about landscape and community as it is about farming history.
The museum was established in 1975 by the Acton Scott estate to preserve and demonstrate the traditional farming skills that were rapidly disappearing as agriculture modernised in the post-war period. From the beginning, the philosophy was not simply to display historic farm equipment in static exhibitions but to keep the old methods alive as a working practice — ploughing with heavy horses, milking by hand, butter-making in the dairy, and tending the livestock with the daily rhythms that shaped the lives of farming families for centuries before mechanisation transformed the countryside.
The farm maintains herds and flocks of rare breed livestock that represent the traditional breeds of the Shropshire and Welsh border countryside. Shropshire sheep, Tamworth pigs, Shire horses, Longhorn cattle, and various poultry breeds graze the fields and inhabit the farm buildings, providing living examples of the animal husbandry that sustained rural communities across the Marches. Many of these breeds are now classified as rare or endangered by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust, and the farm's breeding programmes contribute to the conservation of genetic diversity in British livestock.
Daily demonstrations of traditional farming skills are a central part of the visitor experience. Heavy horses work the fields, ploughing, harrowing, and carting as they did in the Victorian period. The dairy produces butter and cheese using hand methods. The forge, the wheelwright's shop, and the carpenter's workshop show the support crafts that every farming community depended upon. Seasonal activities follow the agricultural calendar — lambing in spring, haymaking in summer, harvest in autumn, and the preparation of the farm for winter creating a programme of events that reflects the genuine rhythms of farming life.
The museum has gained wider recognition as a filming location, having featured in the BBC television series 'Victorian Farm' which brought the daily life of Acton Scott to a national audience and demonstrated the educational value of working agricultural museums. The series and its successors introduced millions of viewers to the skills, hardships, and satisfactions of pre-mechanised farming life.
Acton Scott Working Farm Museum is a family-friendly attraction that offers children direct contact with farm animals, hands-on activities, and an understanding of where food comes from that is increasingly difficult to acquire in modern life. The combination of a beautiful rural setting, rare breed animals, skilled demonstrations, and a genuinely educational approach to farming heritage makes Acton Scott one of the most distinctive and rewarding small museums in the English Midlands.
Categories:
Highlights
Heavy Horse Working Demonstrations
The Shire horses at Acton Scott are the most impressive residents of the farm, and watching these magnificent animals work the fields — ploughing, harrowing, carting, and performing the heavy tasks that powered agriculture before the tractor — is the museum's most memorable experience. The horsemen who work with the Shires demonstrate the skills and commands that were the foundation of English farming for centuries, and visitors can see at first hand the extraordinary strength, patience, and intelligence of these gentle giants.
The working horse demonstrations vary with the season and the agricultural calendar, reflecting the genuine rhythm of horse-powered farming rather than a fixed performance schedule.
Rare Breed Livestock Conservation
The farm maintains breeding herds and flocks of rare and traditional livestock breeds that represent the agricultural heritage of the Shropshire borders and the wider English countryside. Tamworth pigs — a ginger-haired breed that was once common across the Midlands — root and forage in their paddocks.
Shropshire sheep, developed in the county that gives them their name, graze the fields alongside Longhorn cattle and various heritage poultry breeds.
Many of these breeds are classified as vulnerable or at risk by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust, and Acton Scott's breeding programmes contribute to the conservation of genetic diversity in British livestock — a cause that has both cultural and practical significance.
The Victorian Dairy
The dairy at Acton Scott demonstrates butter-making and cheese-making using the hand methods that were standard practice on British farms before the advent of factory dairy processing. Visitors can watch the full process from milk to butter, seeing the cream separated, churned, washed, and worked into pats using traditional wooden equipment.
The dairy demonstrations are among the most popular activities on the farm, offering a direct and satisfying connection between the animals in the fields and the food that reaches the table — a connection that has been largely lost in modern food production.
Seasonal cheese-making demonstrations show the longer and more complex process of producing farmhouse cheese.
Traditional Craft Workshops
The farm includes workshops where the support crafts essential to any Victorian farming community are demonstrated by skilled practitioners. The blacksmith's forge produces horseshoes, tools, and ironwork using the techniques that kept the farm operational. The wheelwright's shop shows the complex and demanding craft of building and repairing the wheels and carts that were the farm's transport system.
Woodworking demonstrations cover the carpentry skills needed for gates, fences, buildings, and the countless wooden objects that a farm required. These craft demonstrations remind visitors that a Victorian farm was not just an agricultural enterprise but a largely self-sufficient community that depended on a wide range of skilled trades.
Collections
Victorian Farming Methods
The core experience of the farm — daily demonstrations of ploughing, dairy work, animal husbandry, and the traditional farming skills that sustained rural England before mechanisation. Activities vary with the season, following the authentic agricultural calendar.
Rare Breeds Collection
The farm's breeding herds and flocks of rare and traditional livestock breeds — Shire horses, Tamworth pigs, Shropshire sheep, Longhorn cattle, and heritage poultry — presented as living examples of the agricultural heritage of the English Midlands and Welsh Marches.
Craft Workshops
Working demonstrations in the blacksmith's forge, wheelwright's shop, and carpenter's workshop, showing the support crafts essential to a Victorian farming community.
Current Exhibitions
A year-round programme of special events including spring lambing weekends, summer haymaking days, autumn harvest festivals, and themed craft and country life events that celebrate the traditions of the rural Shropshire community.