Our history
How it All Began
Our story has a very unlikely beginning. Our founders hadn’t actually intended to create a community – rather, the community found them.
On the way they turned a windswept wasteland into astonishing food gardens, and formed a centre that’s inspired change makers and explorers throughout the world.
The Caddys’ caravan before coming to Findhorn in the 1960s
An unorthodox hotel
Peter Caddy, Eileen Caddy and Dorothy Maclean unintentionally founded the Findhorn community in 1962. When they first came to north-east Scotland in 1957 to manage the Cluny Hill Hotel in Forres, they had all been on a disciplined spiritual path for many years. Eileen received guidance from an inner source she called ‘the still, small voice within’ and Peter ran the hotel in line with this guidance and his own intuition.
In this unorthodox way Cluny Hill swiftly became a successful four-star hotel.
However, after several years and a stint in the Trossachs, the hotel company terminated their employment. With nowhere to go and little money, Peter, Eileen, Dorothy and the three young Caddy boys moved to a caravan park in the nearby coastal village of Findhorn.
Cluny Hill Hotel was run on spiritual principals in the 1950s
A miraculous garden
Feeding six people on unemployment benefits was difficult, so Peter decided to grow vegetables. The land in the caravan park was sandy and dry but he persevered.
In her meditation, Dorothy discovered she was able to intuitively contact the overlighting intelligence of plants – which she called angels, and then devas – who gave her instructions on how to make the most of their fledgling garden.
She and Peter translated this guidance into action, with amazing results. In the barren sandy soil of the Findhorn Bay Caravan Park they grew huge plants, herbs and flowers, most famously the now-legendary 40-pound cabbages. Word spread, horticultural experts came and were stunned, and this garden at Findhorn became famous.
The original garden in the 1960s at Findhorn Bay Caravan Park with Dorothy Maclean, Eileen and Peter Caddy
Birth of a community
Other people came to join the Caddys and Dorothy in their work and soon the original group of six grew into a small community, committed to their spiritual path and to expanding the garden in harmony with nature.
The community published a slim volume of guidance received by Eileen entitled God Spoke To Me, in 1967, and word of this determined and spiritually oriented community spread still further.
Significant friends and supporters of the community in these early days included English New Age pioneer Sir George Trevelyan, Scottish esotericist Robert Ogilvie Crombie (known as ROC) and Richard St Barbe Baker, ‘the man of the trees’.
In the late 60s Peter and community members, in accordance with the inner wisdom being received by Eileen, built the Park Sanctuary and the Community Centre, buildings where the community met to meditate together and to eat. Sadly these buildings were destroyed in two fires on 12 April 2021.
The community grew throughout the 1970s at Findhorn Bay Holiday Park
A centre of spiritual growth
In 1970 a young American spiritual teacher named David Spangler arrived in the community. With his partner, Myrtle Glines, he helped to define and organise the spiritual curriculum, and a programme of learning was established at The Park.
In 1972 the community was formally registered as a Scottish Charity called the Findhorn Foundation. In the 1970s and 80s it grew to approximately 300 members.
In an interesting turn, the Foundation purchased Cluny Hill Hotel in 1975 (which had declined after the Caddy’s departure) as a centre for workshops and and accommodation. In 1983 it purchased the caravan park in Findhorn, which is now known as The Park Ecovillage.
Community’s 30th Birthday photograph at the Community Centre
Some of our founders today
Peter Caddy left the community in 1979 to work internationally. He came back to visit the Park regularly until his death in a car accident in Germany in 1994.
Eileen Caddy lived a long and inspiring life in the community and died peacefully at home in 2006.
Dorothy Maclean, having lived in North America for a number of years and being actively involved in leading workshops around the world, later returned to live in the community. She passed peacefully on 12 March 2020, three months after her 100th birthday.
David Spangler left the community in 1973 and lives in the US Pacific Northwest. He is an author an spiritual director of the Lorian Association.
Left to right: David Spangler, Eileen Caddy, Peter Caddy, Dorothy Maclean