A week in Kylesku – Day 6: Lotte Glob’s Sculpture Garden

Today we’d planned to visit an artist called Lotte Glob who lives and has a sculpture garden just past Durness on the shore of Loch Eriboll. We’d called ahead the day before to make sure it was okay to come, and she’d asked that we go along around 3pm. So that left us with the morning to try and fit something else in. We’ve been having some rough nights with Seren this holiday, and last night was particularly bad, so we thought we’d take it a little easy this morning and take a leisurely drive up through Durness after her morning nap.

It was another beautiful sunny day. We stopped at a viewpoint just after crossing Kylesku Bridge to get a better view from the north side. You can appreciate the way it curves better from this angle. They’d also taken some cones down which they’d had up the earlier in the week for road works so it made for a better picture.


A little later we stopped at a small fishing port called Kinlochbervie. It wasn’t quite what we expected. It’s apparently a major fishing port so it was a little industrial and not very tourist friendly – though its setting on the edge of a loch that spilled out into the sea was still impressive. So we did an about turn and continued back up to Durness to the artists’ village for a bit of lunch.

Loch Eriboll is about 20 mins round the north coast. It’s a stunning area. We drove past another beautiful little beach just outside Durness and took a note to stop off on our way back after the sculpture garden.

Before too long we arrived at Lotte Glob’s. I actually knew about her because of her house, which may have won an architectural prize a couple of years ago, but was certainly nominated. I met the architect once, a guy called Gokey Devicci, who lives and works in Aberdeen. It’s a great house – pretty ‘eco’ – constructed and clad in timber, the form is quite simple and it sits perfectly in the dramatic landscape.

We were greeted by Lotte, an elderly grey haired lady dressed in red overalls, at the foot of her driveway. She shook our hands and gave us a friendly welcome to her place before showing us in to her studio. She told us that she was dutch and has lived in Durness for 40 years before moving to her new home.

Her workshop was filled with finished pieces of her work, and some pieces in progress. She told us that it was fairly new and had been done by the same architect. She was particularly proud of her shower room which she had had tiled in her own hand made tiles. We picked out a couple of small things that we wanted to buy as mementos, three little dishes and a stone shaped colourful ceramic piece. As she was wrapping them up we realised in horror that our cheque book was empty. She insisted that it wasn't a problem and that we could send her a cheque when we got home! Very nice and trusting of her. I gave her my business card and she taped it into her little order book.

We headed out to explore her sculpture garden. She lives on a croft with an incredible view out over the water and to the mountains beyond. She even has a little pebble beach at the foot of her land. Beautiful. The garden was great and had some really interesting pieces set out along a meandering trail, marked by bamboo sticks. Seren fell asleep while we were walking around in the backpack. A first since we started to use it this week! We headed back up to say our thanks and collect our pieces.

On the way back we stopped off at the beach we'd passed by earlier. We parked up and got out. Unfortunately a strong wind caught Laura's door as she was opening and it hit up against the side of the car next to us, a black Ford Ka, leaving a small dent and transferring some of the paint from her door onto theirs. After debating what to do we decided to wait to see who came back to the car to explain what had happened. A few people approached us from the beach but just smiled and walked past. We saw a couple making their way back up further down the beach. We decided to head down and ask them if it was their car, though by process of elimination there was a good chance it was. Sure enough when we asked if it was their car it was. Laura apologised and explained what had happened and we said we'd pay for any damages if they wanted to leave us a note with their details.

The backpack comes with a handy rear view mirror

We felt pretty bad but continued on down to the beach for a look. Another very pretty beach. When we got back to the car there wasn't any note, though they may have taken a note of our license plate. It was just a tiny dent though so hopefully they weren't too bothered.