Well Dressings :

During the summer months in the Peak District you may be lucky to see some samples of the ancient tradition of well dressing. A custom that celebrates water and the life it brings. Many villages have revived this ancient tradition and decorate one or more wells, often combining it with the local carnival. Well dressings are pictures made from growing things (wool, bark, cones, flower petals, berries, leaves and seeds) and other natural materials, constructed on a bed of soft clay spread over a wooden board and erected at the site of the spring or well. Dressing a well can take a team of skilled people up to a week to produce and the finished well will only last a week or so before the flowers fade and the clay dries out and cracks.

We managed to come across the following dressed wells in Buxton and Bakewell!