Tag Archive for: southwestfest

Take Part In SouthWestFest

SouthWestFest Returns for Summer 2021

We are pleased to announce that we will be bringing SouthWestFest back for summer 2021. This year we are ‘Reimagining’ what our community festival looks like and plan to take SouthWestFest to the Streets of south Westminster with a 3 week programme including pop up performances, creative activations, Art Trails, Health Trails and more.

SouthWestFest is a community led event, and there are plenty of ways for local organisations, groups and members of the community to take part.

 Open Access Event Programme

Host your own event, workshops or activity as part of our part of our 3 week celebratory cultural community festival programme which is SouthWestFest. This year the festival will be running from the 2nd to the 23rd July 2021.

The festival is open access and we encourage local community groups, organisations, artists, creatives and individuals to host their own events and activities as part of this community celebration.

Events registered should be either free or very low cost. The aim of the festival is to get local community members out into the area to try new activities and learn about local groups, services and venues in an accessible manner.

This year you can register both online and physical/live events (ensuring they are Covid secure)

This year we are theming our programme…

2nd – 9th July : Health & Wellbeing

10th – 16th July: Arts & Culture

17th – 23rd July: Celebrate Community

It is FREE to register your events in our festival programme! By registering your event or activity as part of our Open Access Programme, you will be included in our printed brochure and on our website in the run up to and during the festival. In return, we ask you to co-promote your event along with the festival, and on registering we will send you our Partner’s Pack which includes a guide on how to co-promote your event as part of the festival.

CLICK HERE to register your event or activity.

Take part in our Online & On Foot Art Trail

Building on our inaugural Art Trail last Summer,  we are aiming to create south Westminster’s biggest community Art Trail to date!

Are you a local artist that lives or works in south Westminster? Then we want you to get involved! The aim of our art trail is to feature  artwork that is created by local artists; bringing art into the community by the community.

The Art Trail will run from Saturday 10th to Friday 16th July 2021:

Online Trail: hosted on our website so that those that are not able to walk around the local area easily can still easily access the art

On Foot Trail: taking place in local venues/residential windows or gardens/public facing spaces so that those who can, can walk around the local area, discover your work, new spaces and be out in the community

the Art Trail Launch Day on Saturday 10th July, will include extra special celebratory pop-up performances and guided tours of sections of the trail.

CLICK HERE to submit your artwork for the Art Trail

Other Ways to Get Involved

There are plenty of other ways to get involved in year’s festival, just head over to our Take Part page to find out more…

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SouthWestFest 16 Years Strong – Legacy Report

2020 marked SouthWestFest’s 16th year working in south Westminster, and has provided us with an opportunity to reflect on our work, and reimagine the future of the festival. 

It can often be hard to quantify the intangible ‘feel good’ benefits of community events and talk about why a cultural community festival such as SouthWestFest deserves public support and funding. However, from the knowledge and experiences gained over the last 16 years of event delivery, we are keen to show how our festival offers important benefits and long-term impacts to residents of south Westminster. 

To support this reflection we have conducted research and produced the following report ‘SouthWestFest 16 Years Strong’ within which we have chosen to analyse the work of our festival, its impacts and benefits including wider research to support our understanding of what community festivals have to offer the people they serve. You can read the report as a PDF here or online here .

Objectives of this report are to:

1) Review our work over the past 16 years, drawing on case studies from the festival, plus feedback and evaluation, to understand where we are today.

2) Review and understand our audiences, the makeup of our community and some of the challenges that they may currently face.

3) Investigate and understand the benefits and wider impact our festival can offer, looking specifically at the areas of health and wellbeing, community engagement and education, volunteering and participation, placemaking and the local economy.

In producing this report, we have used feedback, case studies and data collected by SouthWestFest over the years, in addition to conducting desk based research and analysing evidence from statutory, industry and academic sources.

We hope it offers some deeper understanding of the long term impact of our work and our collaborative activities with community partners, as well as inspiring you to think about how you might like to ‘reimagine’ the festival with us for 2021 and beyond.

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Save SouthWestFest! We need your pledge to help us reimagine the festival for 2021.

SouthWestFest has just launched its first ever crowdfund campaign, and is asking it’s supporters to help fund a reimagined safe and socially distanced festival for 2021.

Check out the page here: https://www.spacehive.com/southwestfest-reimagined

The crowdfund campaign hosted on Spacehive, is part of the #crowdfundwestminster initiative. This pairs large grant givers with crowdfund projects, however these funders will only consider pledging to projects if they can see it has the community’s support – this is shown through small donations from local community members.

SouthWestFest is looking to raise just over £12,000 by January, however the first hurdle comes at the end of November, when the large grant givers will consider the festival’s campaign and decide if they are going to donate. To help the festival show that they have the support of the local community they are asking for the public to pledge, comment and like their campaign page on Spacehive to raise awareness.

The hope is between small local donations, and larger donations from the initiative’s funding pots in November, that the festival can reach its target by the end of January 2021.

Funding will help the organisation organise a 3 week Festival Programme between June and July 2021, offering fun, free, accessible and entertaining socially distanced events held in outdoor spaces, indoor venues and online with partner organisations from across the area.

Joanna Goodey, Festival Director said “Although we may not be able to bring back our big outdoor community festival weekend events in St Georges Square, we still plan on creating a festival celebrating the area for all the community to enjoy. We have some great plans for socially distanced performances, art trails and workshops as well as digital events which can be enjoyed from the comfort of your own home. 2020 has been an incredibly hard year for so many and we want to offer the public something to look forward to and a way to bring our community together again.”

There are two easy ways to support the festival’s campaign:

1) To pledge financial support to the project page – please pledge here: www.spacehive.com/southwestfest-reimagined

Any amount from £2 upwards is a fantastic help, 100 people donating £2 shows more local support to the large funders than 1 person donating £100 (but if you want to donate big don’t let us stop you – we really need all the help we can get!).

2) To share the project through your networks, social media and marketing to help us raise awareness across the area.

We want to thank you in advance for your ongoing support and commitment to the festival!

Team SWF

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Tag Archive for: southwestfest