Popplestones on Bryher
49°57'14.3"N ~ 6°21'24.7"W
We don’t know very much about the labyrinth situated beside Popplestones beach on Bryher yet, but mazes on this site are thought to date back to the 1980s or 1990s. We were told that this site was cleared by the Wildlife Trust in the early 2000s, but the mazes were all back again before too long, presumably reinstated by tenacious maze-makers. If anyone knows who made any of these labyrinths or has any photographs or memories of the site then please get in touch at scillylabyrinths@gmail.com and let us know.
The below black and white photograph, originally published by Glynis Reeve in the Winter 1991 issue of Scillonian magazine (issue 234), shows a square labyrinth connecting to a circular maze in the place where the current circular maze still exists, though the existing one looks smaller than the one in this old photograph. The remains of other mazes are discernible in the grassy areas around the extant maze, so perhaps these could be the remains of these labyrinths. Or others that were built and have become overgrown since the ground was cleared.
We made a photogrammetry scan of the Popplestone’s Maze, so we could view it from different angles that are impossible to see from ground level. These show that the central section is a spiral, with some different path options becoming availalbe in the outer rings.
We plan to update these webpages for the different labyrinths of the islands as our project progresses and we find out more about them. So please if you have any information, stories, ideas, questions or images of any of Scilly’s labyrinths - get in touch with us at scillylabyrinths@gmail.com - we would love to hear from you.