Kent's Leeds Castle Opens Major New Eleanor of Castile Exhibition Featuring World’s First Interactive AI Avatar

Leeds Castle has announced the opening of ‘Pilgrimage of Love: Eleanor of Castile’, a major new exhibition featuring the world’s first interactive historical AI avatar, that is aware of, and responsive to, its environment.

The exhibition explores the life and legacy of Eleanor of Castile (1241–1290), the formidable Queen of England and first female owner of Leeds Castle. 

Through original research, immersive interpretation, and innovative technology, the exhibition sheds new light on one of medieval England’s most remarkable yet overlooked queens, in an unprecedented showcase. 

By foregrounding her life, experiences and character, the exhibition opens up fresh perspectives on her personal narrative, values, and complexities, revealing how her story continues to resonate today.

Dr Dominique Bouchard FRHistS FSA, Heritage and Engagement Director at Leeds Castle told That's Books and More: "What's most exciting about this project is the way it brings people into a more human relationship with the past. 

"We're always striving to help people connect with the Castle's history in ways that feel alive. This new avatar gives visitors a unique chance to meet Eleanor of Castile as a person with depth and personality.

“The technology allows visitors to ask the questions they want to ask, moving beyond the questions we as curators identified and engaging with the scholarship behind the exhibition. It allows us to share a meticulously researched story in a format that feels immediate and personal, inviting visitors to explore Eleanor’s world with curiosity and confidence. That sense of connection has always been at the heart of heritage interpretation, and this exhibition opens up a new way of creating it."

The exhibition, starting in the historic Gloriette built by Eleanor in 1278, explores her politically savvy marriage to King Edward I, extensive travels on crusade, and role as a landowner and businesswoman. This narrative presents Eleanor as a powerful and complex queen in her own right, redefining what it meant to rule as a medieval woman.

Visitors will culminate their experience with An Audience with a Queen, featuring the world’s first AI avatar, developed by SKC Studios, creators of the AI platform 1956 Individuals. Unlike traditional digital interpretation, the avatar is aware of her surroundings and recognises when a visitor approaches. She responds directly to questions, creating a dynamic, unscripted conversation that bridges seven centuries of history and transforms the visitor from observer to participant.

Babita Devi, Co-Founder & Chief Commercial Officer at SKC Studios, told us: “We're proud to partner with Leeds Castle on a project that fundamentally reshapes how history is accessed and experienced. 

Through 1956 Individuals, information moves beyond static interpretation to become intelligent, responsive and immediate, empowering visitors to ask their own questions and engage with the past in real time. 

"This marks a step change for the cultural sector. It demonstrates what forward-thinking cultural stewardship truly means: safeguarding the integrity of heritage while using pioneering technology to unlock deeper, more dynamic access to knowledge for a new generation.”

Eleanor of Castile transformed Leeds Castle into a royal symbol of refinement and luxury, establishing it as a distinctly ‘queenly’ possession. Her influence directly shaped the royal English court through the introduction of cosmopolitan European culture, including tapestries, carpets, and tableware. Eleanor also significantly enhanced the Castle’s architecture, evolving it from a Norman fortress into the elegant structure we see today.

Pilgrimage of Love: Eleanor of Castile

• Opens Monday 9 March 2026 at Leeds Castle, Kent

• Included in admission ticket

• Explores the life and legacy of Leeds Castle’s first female owner

• Features the world’s first interactive historical AI avatar

 www.leeds-castle.com

Totnes community bookshop launches crowdfunding bid to secure its future

The stark warning is: “Too many independent, community minded shops are disappearing from our high streets."

Castle Books in Totnes, Devon, has launched a £135,000 crowd-funding campaign to acquire its premises at 4 Castle Street and to thus help secure the future of its community bookshop and outreach programmes.

With the building up for sale, and the shop’s lease coming to an end, the future of the historic and much-loved shop is in jeopardy. Now Castle Books’ dedicated team of volunteers are calling on book lovers from Totnes and around the world to support its campaign by visiting its crowd funding page, making a donation, and helping to spread the word on social media.

For over 50 years, readers, writers, and book collectors living in and visiting Totnes have made a beeline for the second-hand bookshop, located a few steps from the high street in the shadow of one of England’s best preserved Norman castles. 

The shop has changed hands just once in the past five decades, and since 2016 has been owned by a Community Interest Company (CIC). 

It is operated entirely through the good will of a its volunteers who also organise regular literary events for the wider community, including a monthly Book Group and Poetry Open Mic (without the mic!) There are no paid staff. All profits from book sales are channelled back into the local community to support local literary causes.

Among the beneficiaries are Totnes Library, which has received over £5,000 from the shop since 2021. The library staff have used this to help install a new ‘teen hub’, with the support of KEVICCs students, and to create a versatile and welcoming space for community groups and those seeking company and shelter during the energy and cost of living crisis. 

Eve Ashton, Centre Manager for Torbay Libraries commented: “We really can't thank Totnes Community Bookshop enough for their kindness and their generosity. The projects their funding has enabled have had such an impact on thousands of people, of all ages and backgrounds, who use the library.”

Another regular recipient is Grove School, Totnes, whose Headteacher Hilary Priest said: “The Totnes community bookshop at Castle Street has been a genuine and very real godsend to us over the years helping us to buy new books for our children. The donations they give have meant our children are really supported in their love of reading and their readiness for secondary school.”

The story of Castle Books began in 1969 when Belle Collard bought 4 Castle Street and opened Totnes’s first vegetarian and wholefood café. In 1972 Belle put a shelf of books in the upstairs dining area for her customers to enjoy. An advert described it as “The only restaurant in Devon where you can buy a first edition with your first course, and a print with your pudding.”

Gradually the books took over from the food and Belle began to put all her energies into buying and selling book stock. So much so, that in 1975 the restaurant gave way to ‘Collards Books’, filling all three floors of the building.

As Belle aged, she found climbing the stairs increasingly demanding and in 1991, aged 72, she took the decision to limit the shop to the ground floor where she continued working two or three days a week for another 20 years, with the help of some trusted volunteers.

When Belle sadly passed away on 15 September 2013, she bequeathed her entire stock of books to her volunteers who established a community interest company (CIC) to continue the shop’s operation. Her daughter Jennie, who inherited 4 Castle Street, generously granted the newly formed CIC a 10-year lease on the ground-floor shop before selling the building. And thus Castle Books was born.

Castle Books continues to be run by a 20-plus team of committed volunteers and is held in warm affection by both local customers and visitors to Totnes. The range, quality and affordability of the books are as notable as ever, with regular acquisitions backed by generous donations ensuring the stock is always fresh and always relevant.

“We recognise it's a big ask in these somewhat difficult times, but we want to do all we can to secure Belle’s legacy and keep Castle Books as a thriving literary and community hub for Totnes, hopefully for another 50 years!” said volunteer manager Francis Checkley. 

“Too many independent, community minded shops are disappearing from our high streets. Purchasing the fabric of the shop will allow us to secure our future for new, future generations of book lovers and ensure our community bookshop remains a vital part of Totnes’s heritage.”

Would you like to help secure a ‘happily ever after’ for Castle Books, its volunteers, and the community they serve? Then please visit the shop’s Crowdfunding page to donate and help spread the word via social media. 

“Customers from all corners of the world seek out (and stumble upon) Castle Books for our wonderful choice of books and friendly welcome. We’re sure many of them would be willing to contribute – if only they knew about our campaign,” said Francis.

https://www.castlebooks.org

https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/save-castle-books-community-bookshop