The Robertsbridge 800 Time Capsule is an ambitious community artwork created to mark the village’s 800th anniversary as a chartered settlement.

Led by local artist Martin Brockman, the project has brought together residents, schools and community groups over the past year to create 800 ceramic tiles, each formed from Robertsbridge clay and decorated using natural, foraged pigments. Every tile carries a personal reflection of the village, capturing its landscape, wildlife, stories and sense of place through individual mark-making.

An exhibition at Blackshed Gallery in February 2026 represented possibly the only time all 800 tiles will be displayed together. Installed as a striking ‘pavement’ within the gallery, the work sets the scene for a future archaeological discovery based for some future generation.

Following the exhibition, the tiles will be buried as a time capsule beneath an oak sapling.

This contemporary record of community life in the 21st century allows Robertsbridge 800 to live on as a future legacy - one that will be shaped by time, landscape got whoever one day rediscovers it.

Robertsbridge Archaeological Society accompanied the exhibition with a historical display of photographs, artefacts and archive material, offering visitors a rich timeline of the village’s past and placing the Time Capsule within the wider story of Robertsbridge across the centuries.