If you have driven down country roads and past tiny villages, you may have noticed households with scarecrows in their gardens. This is a great way to bring the community together and raises community spirit in the area. So why not bring the scarecrows to Felixstowe? It has never been done before. 

That is until now. Luke Smout has been providing news and information for the town but also has been organising events which ultimately benefit the community. 

‘The Felixstowe Scarecrow Festival’ will take place on the 25th of July until the 31st of July and has already seen much support. 

The festival will be raising money for the BASIC Life Charity. Graham Denny and the charity volunteers have been working tirelessly for years supporting Felixstowe and Walton. More recently, throughout the pandemic, they have set up an Emergency Resource Centre, which helps those most hard hit by the coronavirus. The aim is to raise community morale and spread ‘The Great Felixstowe Community Spirit’ to every corner of the town. 

If you want to enter a scarecrow, please place it outside your household for the 23rd July take a photo and email it to luke@felixstowe.news. Luke will feature your photo on Felixstowe & Suffolk News Facebook Page, social media platforms and website. 

Please also send a rough estimate of your area if you intend to enter your scarecrow by FRIDAY 17TH JULY 2020 so Luke can direct people towards your scarecrow. 

Luke suggests a minimum donation of £5 to enter your scarecrow and all monies will be donated to the BASIC Life Charity. 

To donate, click on the link: paypal.me/FelixstoweNewsPay 

From temporary studios of laptop computers, microphones and lights, set up in the home of authors and interviewers, the Felixstowe Book Festival’s venture into the online world was a tremendous success. 

Meg Reid, the Festival director said,

“What a wonderful weekend! A feast of diverse and varied talks watched by people from all over the world. Thank you to everyone who has contributed to taking Felixstowe Book Festival online and to everyone who has sent such lovely appreciative messages. On our Facebook page we can see that over 8,000 people watched some or all of the online Festival and that figure is still rising as all of the videos are still on Facebook, and the Festival webpage, to watch or watch again.”

Felixstowe Book Festival  had people tuning in from Ohio, Illinois, Michigan, New York, Jacksonville Florida, California, Australia, Cape Town South Africa, Ontario Canada, Shanghai, Omagh Northern Ireland, Netherlands, Belgium, Paris, North Yorkshire, Devon, Basingstoke, Nottingham, Berkhamstead, South Godstone Surrey, London and (closer to home)….Norfolk, Ipswich, Bury St Edmunds, Hadleigh and… Felixstowe. 

The Festival went live through entertaining interviews with Paul French, Liz Trenow, Nick Cottam, Carol Drinkwater, George Alagiah and Harriet Tyce. A fascinating evening was spent with Brontë expert Nick Holland on Friday evening and Martin Bell mused on his life and career on Saturday evening. The weekend was peppered with video insights into the days in the lockdown lives of some favourite authors. The younger festival fans enjoyed story readings and drawalongs to keep them busy. 

“All in all, our packed programme provided some much-needed literary sustenance to everyone during one of the strangest and most stressful year of our lives. Next year’s festival will be held on the last weekend in June and we hope to be back at our home at The Orwell Hotel, Felixstowe.”

The festival organisers raised over £1000 from donations via JustGiving and the festival was also supported by local sponsors.

A huge thanks to all participants!

Images provided by Felixstowe Book Festival

Exciting news! Felixstowe Book Festival has started! Across this weekend they will be hosting a series of live-streamed author Q&As and interviews online, plus talks and videos and more!

All live events across the weekend will be streamed on their Facebook page. To watch simply click HERE.

You can view the full programme of events HERE.

If you would like to help us out this year with a donation, take a look at our fundraising page HERE. 

Enjoy you weekend folks!