Behind the scenes of the great Peter Rabbit Egg Hunt

Designing the eggs

Months before the day of the Egg Hunt our Events Co-ordinator and Egg-Organiser-in-Chief gets in touch with Sue Dunne, a ceramic artist in the north of England to discuss designs for the following year’s eggs.

Creating the eggs

Sue says: “The eggs are a real labour of love. Since 2008 I have made more than 1000 unique eggs based on a number of Beatrix Potter characters. Each egg goes through several stages – from making and firing to hand-painting then glaze-firing to 110 degrees centigrade in order to keep the colours as close as possible to those of the living plants. It is wonderful creating something based on these amazing tales. “And it fits in well with my work because I draw most of my inspiration from the natural world.”

“It’s still exciting thinking of people searching for them in such beautiful surroundings, and I have heard from quite a few successful hunters telling me how much they like their eggs.”

This year’s eggs

The 2018 eggs depict a gorgeous feather created from one of Sue’s moulds and inspired by nature. Sue’s ceramic eggs have become collectors’ items since she was first invited to make the eggs in 2008. Will you find a 2018 egg?

Delivering the eggs

When the eggs are ready they are packed up in boxes and delivered to us at the World of Beatrix Potter Attraction ready to hide!

Searching locations

Lot of time and effort is then put in to pouring over a Lake District map to find good locations for our eggs and nice places to send our families to explore. We really try to find places that are interesting and that you might not have been before.

Hiding eggs

This is the fun part and just before the egg hunt we despatch our special egg hiders incognito in our special locations. This is often more difficult that you might think. Sometimes it can feel like the whole world knows what you have in your rucksack!

But Where is Peter Rabbit?

Peter Rabbit is a very busy chap and over the years he has been up, down and around the Lake District to hide our beautiful eggs. Sometimes this has involved some very exciting adventures! We’d love to tell you more but I’m afraid that has to stay top secret.

On the day!

This might be our 10th year, but on the day we still have pre-event nerves as we want everyone to have a super time! Sometimes people complain when they don’t find an egg, but we hope the majority of people enjoy the day for what it is – great fun in the outdoors and a fantastic way to collectively raise money for a worthy cause. Egg Hunt HQ has a period of calm at 10am, but usually by 11am all has descended in to frantic answering of messages and calls as we keep tabs on our 100 eggs and who has found them where. Half the team are answering the phones whilst the rest man the twitter feed and egg hunt map taking off eggs as they are found. It’s a high octane day in the office!

Feeling nostalgic

Looking back on 10 years of our Peter Rabbit Treasure Trails, we have had some pretty amazing times. From glorious sunshine to stormy skies, there’s been ups and downs, twists and turns but it’s still a great day out! This is Edward Brownell age 8 from Windermere who found an egg in our very first Egg Hunt in 2008 at Brockhole.

2014 – Chelsea Flower show & Brilliant sunshine

In 2014 this couple were on a mini-break from Wolverhampton and were lucky enough to find an egg at Tarn Hows which was in fact the Grand Prize. They popped in to the Attraction to find they had won a weekend in London with train travel, hotel accommodation and tickets to see the World of Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit Herb Garden at the Chelsea Flower Show. Well done guys! Egg 48 was a winner!

2016 – The Marriage Proposal

Beatrix Potter’s 150th anniversary in 2016 was a big year for us but even we can’t beat the tale of Michael & Helen who brought us our first Marriage proposal! Michael proposed to Helen when they found the 150th egg during the 2016 Peter Rabbit Treasure Trail, they were married a few months later and their wedding photos even featured Peter Rabbit, reminding them that the Hunt was finally over.

Our wonderful egg hunters

We’ve had so many lovely egg hunters, winners and participants over the years and have raised nearing £20,000 for WaterAid. We chose WaterAid to benefit as we live in a part of the world that has so much water (some might say too much, but not us of course…), so it felt right that we should help people who are living constantly with a shortage of water.

Are you taking part this year?

If you are taking part this year we’d love to hear from you so we can update our blog at the end of the event with some stories from the day. Please email [email protected] with pictures and tales!