Loch Arthur is a place where vulnerable men and women with learning disabilities, emotional and mental health problems can live and work with others in healthy social relationships based on mutual care and respect.

In addition to those who have made this their long-term home, each year a group of around fifteen young volunteers from all over the world come to join us as part of the community. They stay for six to twelve months. There are also sixteen children, six dogs, innumerable cats and four pet goats.

Though rural (six miles from Dumfries in the village of Beeswing) we are very integrated and involved in both the immediate and the wider local community.

Shared Homelife
There are seven houses; at present each household has between three and five people with special needs; a family, some with children; and two or three young short-term volunteers.

Rather than a relationship of those who are “cared for” and “carers” we seek a relationship of mutual care. Our aim is to live a “shared life” within the wider community without the conventional divisions between “staff” and “residents”. “Community” is not a place but arises out of the quality of our relationships.