Dave’s Place – Commemorating Brigadoon’s Founder

On Tuesday, August 27th, Brigadoon Village, along with family, volunteers, campers, and community leaders, gathered to announce the creation of Dave’s Place – a new arts centre at the camp that will celebrate and honour the memory of Brigadoon’s Founder and Visionary, Dave McKeage.

The new arts centre is designed to bring campers together to create and imagine, whether it’s with clay and pottery, paint and canvas or instruments and dancing. Dave’s Place will feature a ceramics studio, a music studio, and a messy arts room, and will be the centrepiece at Brigadoon Village where kids will gather to express themselves in a fun, accessible environment.

Dave McKeage was never afraid to dream big. It was McKeage’s own battle with cancer that prompted him to spend many years working to open Brigadoon Village. With over 800 kids attending camp this summer, Brigadoon Village is now Canada’s largest pediatric illness camp and offers 14 camp programs which are designed to accommodate a health condition or other life challenge for kids aged 7 to 18. Brigadoon is guided by the core values of sustainability, compassion, partnerships, empowerment, accountability and innovation. Brigadoon provides extraordinary kids a chance to be ordinary through an amazing camp experience and has hosted over 3,500 campers in its nine years of existence.

Also announced was that long time Brigadoon supporter Peter Kohler is giving $200,000 towards Dave’s Place. Peter wanted to help commemorate Dave at camp, so he came forward as a catalyst for starting the project. We immediately starting consulting with Dave’s wife, Krista, and other family members and close friends and this beautiful legacy was conceived. Music and creative expression filled Dave with joy. This was part of his dream for Brigadoon.