The Camphill Movement

Camphill is a world-wide movement dedicated to building communities where everyone can find purpose and belonging. The first Camphill community was founded in Aberdeen in 1940 by a group of refugees led by Dr Karl Konig, an Austrian paediatrician. Inspired by the ideas of Rudolf Steiner they found their purpose living and working with children with learning disabilities. At that time people with learning disabilities were excluded from education and many other dimensions of society. Camphill took the opposite approach and created communities where the individuality and potential of even profoundly challenged children was developed.
Nowadays, Camphill communities welcome children, adults and older people. We value as much as ever the profound significance of each human being. We are mindful of our responsibility to the earth in building sustainable community life. Together we create transformative living experiences for children, youth and adults with learning disabilities and other support needs.

Click here to read about Karl König.

Inclusion and Participation

We create truly enabling communities where people with learning disability and other support needs can achieve their individual potential. This is just as relevant now as when Camphill began over seventy years ago. In those days, mainstream society sought the segregation and isolation of people with learning disabilities. Nowadays, things are very different but Camphill still provides a model of inclusion and participation for others to follow.

Community and Mutual Support

We believe that each of us can only truly flourish if we feel part of a community. This is particularly relevant today when so many people feel lonely and isolated.

Ecology and Sustainability

Our communities respect and celebrate the natural world around them and take steps to minimise environmental impact through, for example, bio-dynamic agriculture, fair trade practices and energy saving activities.

The contemporary relevance of Camphill rests on these three main pillars.

Link to Camphill Movement website