Wildacres Writers Workshop

The 2024 Workshop is currently full.

Join us each summer in the heart of North Carolina’s beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains for the experience of a lifetime. For more than 40 years, our annual residential writing workshop has ranked among the finest, and most affordable, in the country.

At Wildacres Writers Workshop, you’ll find a diverse writers’ community and lasting friendships, expert faculty to help you strengthen your creative writing skills and craft, and a place to feel recharged and inspired.

Excellent faculty, beautiful location, small-group workshops, readings, and activities — all at an incredible price.

2024 Dates

Application period has ended.

Apply for the waitlist

Retreat:
(for Workshop attendees + their
non-writing guests)

June 30 – July 6, 2024

Workshop:

July 6-13, 2024

More about Workshop schedule

2024 Writing Class Tracks

Creative Nonfiction

Flash Fiction

Novel

Poetry

Short Story

Learn about our 2024 faculty

2024 Fees

Fees include onsite double-occupancy lodging and all meals

Workshop: $910

Retreat: $485

50% deposit due May 1

Balance due June 1

More about Workshop fees

Testimonials

“There is nothing like being in a community of writers to stimulate creativity. Every class I’ve had has been rewarding. Wildacres is magic.”
Les Brown

A young woman sits on the ground, enjoying a view of the Blue Ridge Mountains at Wildacres workshop.

“At Wildacres I’ve found a place where I can take myself seriously as a writer and lightly as a person. The faculty and community of peers have been phenomenal supports and keep me coming back summer after summer for another deeply satisfying draft of craft and inspiration.”
Celisa Steele

A group of Wildacres writers, smiling at the camera, sit together on the patio’s rocking chairs and benches.

“Wildacres is a fantastical experience where your best writing is done in a playful, accepting, liberating environment. Where writers share their best secrets and insights, and judging is tender. You work hard and play hard — all at an affordable price that will have you exclaim BEST DEAL EVER!”
Leah Weiss, bestselling author of If the Creek Don’t Rise and All the Little Hopes

A full moon shines down on the softly lit Wildacres lodges and surrounding trees in the evening.

“The first day, you will be stunned by your roommate. The second day you will be stunned by your teacher. The third day you will be stunned by your classmates. By day four, words begin sprinkling your mind. By day five the words are pouring into your mind. Not even a bucket could help you carry them.”
Rebecca Wallace

“For the first time since I was 12 years old, I feel like I have found my own family again; people and traditions I can count on. I go to Wildacres and know I will see people dear to my heart. I know I will enjoy pre-dinner drinks on the porch before sitting down and passing food between the people I love — all to the tune of lively conversations. I know I will dance like a fool with other brilliant fools, and snort at shared jokes during the Gong Show. I know I will laugh and cry and hug and be hugged, and bare my soul and behold the souls of others. I know I will belong.”
Leah Senona

Students and auditors sit around a large square table, listening to their instructor, during a Wildacres writing class.

“I have attended workshops all over the country, including Hawaii, and Wildacres is the best. It’s a great learning experience and an outstanding community of writers.”
Anonymous

A young woman smiles and plays a banjo while a man plays guitar and sings on the Wildacres patio.

“Wildacres is like coming home to myself. I am a writer, surrounded by writers, in a place where every encounter from workshops to events to random conversations on the patio reinforce my sense of who I am — a writer.”
Elaine Miller

Writers sit and chat in rocking chairs on the Wildacres patio, overlooking a sunset view of the mountains.

One of National Geographic’s “100 Places That Will Change Your Life”
National Geographic, 2018