Viewpoints

Since the late 1990s the Kielder Art and Architecture Trail has been providing visitors with an opportunity to pause and reflect on the installations and see how different people have tried to create works that respond to the landscape in different ways.

Some installations are large scale, striking and award winning such as Belvedere, 55/02 and Kielder Observatory, while others are smaller in scale but no less dramatic such as Stell or Freya's Cabin. There are also those that a very small scale and situated subtly in the landscape, such as Viewpoints.

Designed by Tania Kovats and installed in 1998, Viewpoints is a 3D, concrete sculpture of the Ordnance Survey Viewpoint symbol. It sits on the northern shore at Needs Hill, between Silvas Capitalis and Janus Chairs, and gives a gorgeous view across the lake. It was designed to prompt visitors to question their existing ideas of what makes a picturesque view.

When it was originally installed there was a corresponding sculpture on the south shore opposite at Halfpenny Rigg, though this has now disappeared. Beneath the water in front of Viewpoints was the location of Plashett's Station, before the valley was flooded, which was a stop on the Border Counties Railway that ran from Hexham, along the Tyne valley, and on to Edinburgh and Carlisle, via the Waverley Line, from Riccarton Junction just across the Scottish border.

Viewpoints can be accessed, on foot or bicycle, via the Lakeside Way and is around 3.25km from Kielder Castle Car Park.