EVENTS AT SWANSTON

From charity challenges to endurance endeavours, MTB to vehicle displays, fashion, TV and film shoots, the rugged backdrop of Swanston Farm offers a fantastic variety of terrain for your event.

Swanston Farm has hosted many events and brands, some of which are listed below. For further information or to discuss your event, please contact us.

CHANNEL 4

Channel 4

Swanston Farm was honoured to welcome talented finalist of Channel 4’s ‘The Piano’ for filming, 10 year old Sum. Sum and his family visited Swanston Farm and our Highland Cows on a chilly winter’s morning for some filming ahead of the final episode of Series 2. It was a sparkling, sunny morning, with freezing temperatures and frost giving us all pink noses, whilst Sum and his Dad enjoyed meeting Thelma & Louise, our 2 OAP Highland Cows.

MATT BAKER

Matt Baker took his Mum Janice and Dad Mike on a special Christmas trip to Edinburgh and popped up to visit us here at Swanston Farm! Along with a wonderful visit to the Royal Yacht Britannia and the Kinloch Anderson Kilts and Highland Dress hub, the family enjoyed a close-up encounter with our Highland Cows as they joined us during one of our winter farm days. You can watch the episode here.

LS PRODUCTIONS

L S PRODUCTIONS

LS Productions took over the hills here at Swanston Farm for a day, filming for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. An early start saw the most stunning of sunrises and we were blessed with a sunny September day. You can see the finished product here

ARTEMIS PENTLAND PEAKS CHALLENGE

Artemis Pentland Peaks Challenge

The Artemis Pentland Peaks Challenge is an annual charity walking event that takes place in the Pentland Hills near Edinburgh. The routes include Gold (27 miles), Silver (14 miles) and Bronze (10 miles) test every level of fitness with the Gold route including the challenging peaks of Caerketton and Allermuir Hills on Swanston Farm land.

OXFORD FILMS

Oxford Films came to Swanston Farm to shoot on location with English actor, author and stand-up comedian Alexei Sayle for a documentary.

The Fringe, Fame and Me is the story of how a small Scottish arts festival that began 75 years ago this year became a national institution – a crucible where new stars are forged, careers made, and sometimes, dreams dashed. Told by the stars who first found fame at the Edinburgh Fringe, this is the inside story of what it takes to make a name here, from those who enjoyed overnight success to those who slogged for years to make it. Through their triumphs, favourite jokes, and sometimes painful failures, we’ll discover a hidden history of British comedy – revealing how the gags we find funny and the comedians we love reflect our changing culture.

Watch now on iPlayer.

THE GREATEST DANCER

We had a very special visit from an extremely talented local dancer; Ellie Ferguson, who was a finalist in the BBC’s ‘Greatest Dancer’. Ellie came along with her mum and a film crew from Thames TV to conduct some location filming to go towards Ellie’s training clips shown on the night of the final. It was a very cold and windy day and the footage was shot with the magnificent views of Caerketton Hill and the City of Edinburgh, however 14 year old Ellie – a true professional – took it all in her (graceful) stride. Despite the cold it was a lovely few hours spent and we were able to witness first-hand Ellie’s incredible ability. Ellie performed the most beautiful final dance, along with her Dance Captain, Oti Mabuse on the night of the live final and we were delighted that she won the competition. You can watch the final episode here – see if you can spot our hills!

SALOMON

The Salomon Trail Running Festival came to Swanston Farm for their Edinburgh session on 2nd June 2018, bringing a huge number of runners keen to take part in the various activities over the weekend.

Runners were able to enter the 10km and 20km timed races, covering terrain over the Pentland Hills as well as yoga sessions, a mini trail for children under the age of 14, guided runs, talks and workshops and a variety of other activities. With food and drink vendors keeping everyone on site happy, including the fantastic Pizza Geeks, YoFrog and Prime Street Food, the participants and spectators enjoyed a great weekend of exercise and entertainment, including the evening bar and live band.

Base Camp was located at the Easterly end of our farm in an exclusive grassy area regularly used by companies who run their events from Swanston Farm.

VISIT SCOTLAND

VisitScotland and American film company ‘Fifty Films‘ spent the morning at Swanston Farm, filming their young Millenials saying hello to our Highland Cattle, as part of their trip around Scotland. You can watch the completed video here: ‘Come Along with VisitScotland’

You can also read more about the campaign on the VisitScotland website.

WORLD CURLING CHAMPIONS

Team Mouat, which is led by Edinburgh-born skipper, Bruce Mouat, were crowned 2023 world curling champions in Ottawa after defeating their Canadian hosts.

Team Mouat also took home the silver medal at the 2022 Olympics in Beijing and they came along to have a photoshoot at Swanston Farm.

Bruce, Hammy, Bobby and Grant visited Swanston Farm as part of the nationwide campaign for Magnum Liqueur following the Team’s epic win in Canada. We were honoured to meet the team and see the Trophy – huge congratulations to Team Mouat!

If you think you have a budding curling champ in your family, head over to Scottish Curling to find out more, including your nearest curling club. Make sure you give Team Mouat a follow on their Facebook, Instagram and Twitter pages for their latest news!

RAT RACE ADVENTURES

The Ultra Tour of Edinburgh is unique – it’s an Ultra Run in a city like no other. Rat Race Adventures is the UK’s best known adventure sports outfit and the Edinburgh course weaves 57km through streets, alleyways, onto hills, up crags, past monuments, museums, seats of Royalty, Government and up and down 3000 feet of ascent and descent. In 2017 and 2019 the runners battled our hills and climbs on the farm on their route and it was brutal, with around 800 runners tackling the course.

RED BULL

The Pentland Hills within the diverse landscape of Swanston Farm were the playground for the 2015 Red Bull “Foxhunt” event with Jeep for the second year running. This women-only mountain-biking race saw over 100 competitors (the ‘Hounds’) tackle the epic downhill terrain from the peak of Caerketton Hill, to the finish line at Lothianburn. In hot pursuit was the World’s best downhill mountain bike racer, Rachel Atherton (the ‘Fox’), with the aim of passing as many ‘hounds’ as possible.

Read more about the event here, watch the breathtaking footage from Rachel Atherton’s headcam here and check out the gallery of photographs from the event.

THE PUSH

Swanston Farm provided the venue for The Push in 2015, one of Scotland’s most fantastic charity challenges in aid of St Columba’s Hospice. The Push Gold route is one of the toughest challenge events in Scotland, featuring 2400m of height gain over its 26.2 miles, this cross-country challenge event features 3 different routes covering 14, 20 and 26.2 miles through the striking Pentland Hills. As an independent charity, St Columba’s Hospice must raise £8 million every year to continue to provide patients, their families and friends with their first class care and the St Columba’s Hospice provide first class care for those with progressive, advanced, life limiting illnesses across Edinburgh and the Lothians and support for their patients’ families, friends and carers through the toughest of times.

PENTLAND TRAIL CENTRE

A public exhibition was held on Tuesday 5th March 2019 at Swanston Brasserie, 111 Swanston Road, Edinburgh, EH10 7DS from 2pm until 7pm.

This took take place in the ground floor function room (‘Templar Room’) where full plans were available to view. The event was open to all and we welcomed the public to come along and find out more about the project, ask questions and give feedback.

The public exhibition was part of the pre-application consultation on the Pentland Trail Centre. This is a development on the site of the former Lothianburn Golf Course for a new mountain bike (MTB) trail and other activities centre.

The site is being developed by Hillend Leisure Limited – a joint venture between Swanston Farm Ltd (the site owner) and Advie Properties.

You can view all of the information in detail below.