Chatsworth Road Festival.

Dear Folks of Chatsworth Road.

createdgallery — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 11:51:19 +0000

Here is a letter from the Chair of the Festival group which was published in the current S40Local magazine. Our next planning meeting is on 8th February and we’ll be discussing plans for involving more local businesses as well as improving publicity for the Festival.

Dear Folks of Chatsworth Road,

I would like to thank you all for supporting our first Chatsworth Road Festival. It happened: which was a miracle in itself considering the short time we gave ourselves to make it happen and our budget (non-existent until the last minute, then small). But it did happen and the sun shone on us for the start of the festival. People walked up and down Chatsworth Road to visit familiar places as well as discover some new ones. The popular Food Fair was started and we even had a poem written about Chatsworth Road. We celebrated life on Chatsworth Road which was the Festival’s aim.

Now we are starting to plan for the 2012 Festival – well done to those who noticed the word ‘first’ in my opening sentence, yes there will be more. This seems a good moment to explain who we are:

Deirdre Gage from Created Gallery, local resident & Chairperson
Paul Chapman from S40 Local, local resident & Secretary
Colin Harrison local resident & Treasurer
Clare Gage, local resident & artist
Shirley Niblock, local councillor
Sallyanne Beecham, St Thomas’ Centre co-ordinator

We form the Chatsworth Road Festival Group & our aim is to organise the Festival each year. I hope that we can introduce ourselves more in future editions ofS40 Local. This year we have given ourselves more time to get to grips with issues like publicity, contacting a larger number of businesses & households along Chatsworth Road and encouraging people to plan more ambitious events to take place during the Festival. We will be announcing a theme for this year’s festival in the next S40 Local but our aim is to celebrate living & working around Chatsworth Road.

If you would like to organise an event or offer your help in any way, please contact me or Paul Chapman. Paul’s contact details are at the front of S40 Local and I can be reached through Created Gallery or by email info@createdgallery. Meanwhile you can follow us on Twitter (@chatsrdfestival), find us on Facebook (Chatsworth Road Festival) or follow our blog (www.chatsworthroadfestival.wordpress.com).

The planning starts here!

createdgallery — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 12:06:13 +0000

Just a quick post to let you know that we are starting our planning for the 2012 Chatsworth Road Festival today. If you have any ideas for the event, please get in touch through S40 Local or on our Facebook page or here. We are looking for events that you organise – your business, your church, your community group. The Festival is about the people in & around Chatsworth Road: their work, lives, hobbies and talents. So if you are part of a choir and would like to be involved, get in touch & we’ll help you find a venue then list you in the Festival Guide.

Once again we are planning on a wing and a prayer but no money. This is a community festival and it is what we, the community, make of it. If it didn’t happen last year, then why don’t you make it happen this year? More posters needed? Are you a printer who could do some for the Festival? You are very welcome to add your logo onto each of them.

If the Chatsworth Road Festival has a motto then it must be Necessity is the Mother of Invention, so get inventing ways to celebrate our lives around here but on a shoestring budget. We know it can be done, we’ve managed once already (can’t expect the weather every year though).

Chatsworth Road is Paris, Derbyshire

createdgallery — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 15:02:01 +0000

Chatsworth Road is Paris, Derbyshire,

the Champs Elysées for the Chesterfield shopper.

It’s hip, and only a step to the Hipper.

“You can live and die on Chatsworth Road, duck”-

everything you need, from nappies to coffins,

pubs, potteries, churches, Tinny Johnson,

Robbo’s, Hattersley, Mr.English, Pogson’s.

“Hop on, duck. Last tram to the Terminus.”

Where St. Thomas’s bells ring the kitchens.

Now stamp your card, do the Brampton Mile,

do the shop, do the hop, do the Brampton stomp.

The road out west to a dream called Derbyshire.

S40, it’s the new Montmartre,

cafés, books, knitters and croissants.

And I wouldn’t be surprised to see Jarvis Cocker.

Matt Black

Update on the weekend 1st/2nd October.

createdgallery — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 14:45:00 +0000

Well didn’t we have wonderful weather for the launch of the Festival? There were plenty of crossed fingers for a fine weekend and all our wishes were granted by the weather fairy. The Food Fair at St Thomas’ was a roaring success with an estimated 800 people attending. People enjoyed the event so much that the Church is organising a monthly Food Fair starting next month, Sat 5th November.

It was great to hear that Brampton Courtyard had lots of visitors. It is one of the hidden treasures of the area & well worth seeking out. I believe that the photographer from the Derbyshire Times was taking photographs down there, so look out for this week’s edition to find out more.

On Sunday there were several houses having clutter clearances in their front gardens – hopefully this will be a bigger part of next year’s festival. It’s always good to have a sort out every so often & better to help your old possessions find new homes than just be thrown away to create more space.

The weather was a little cooler than Saturday, which proved popular with the Chesterfield Cock & Magpie Morris dancers & the Chesterfield Garland Dancers. They performed between Mesamis & Koo cafes to the enjoyment of both sets of customers as well as quequing traffic on Chatsworth Road.

I Spy With My Little Eye….

createdgallery — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 13:56:58 +0000

The eagle eyed amongst you will have spotted that window flashes advertising the Festival have begun to appear in shop windows. As with everything to do with the Festival, willing volunteers have been rushing about trying to visit venues & businesses to hand out the window flashes. If you’d like one, pop into Created where we have some spare.

Look out for our window flashes appearing along Chatsworth Road.

The Festival Guide is out now.

createdgallery — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 11:39:18 +0000

It’s here at last. The guide to the Chatsworth Road Festival is out in the latest edition of S40 Local. For those folk who regularly receive S40 Local it should be popping onto your doormat this week. For those who don’t receive one, I have a few in Created Gallery but you can read the latest edition by going to http://www.s40local.co.uk.

Please spread the word to friends, neighbours, family & work colleagues – we have an advertising budget of exactly (to the nearest penny) ZERO. In fact that is the figure for the whole festival budget. But this hasn’t stopped people offering free help of all kinds and we are still open to offers of help. We’d love to set some helium balloons off to mark the start of the Festival, does anyone feel that they can help here? A bit of free printing even at this late stage would be appreciated, too. Be inventive & creative has been one of our mottos.

I’m assured that the website (another freeby, thank you Vidbo www.vidbo.co.uk) will be ready soon with more info & details of the guide. Our website will be www.chatsworthroadfestival.co.uk

Until then I’ll try to keep you upto date through the blog & Colin will update the Facebook page with new events http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Chatsworth-Road-Festival/146037692144947. For info on the Derbyshire Poet Laureate, Matt Black’s contribution I will update my original entry on this blog.

Enjoy browsing the Guide.

A joyful meeting with the new Derbyshire Poet Laureate – Matt Black.

createdgallery — Sat, 17 Sep 2011 13:21:51 +0000

Earlier this week I told you that I was to meet the DPL (Derbyshire Poet Laureate) but their identity was secret, totally hush hush. I have been given official permission to reveal that the DPL for the next 2 years is Matt Black from Sheffield http://matt-black-words.co.uk . We had a great meeting & Matt is delighted to be involved in the festival. He was very surprised to hear how much is going on round here & was scribbling notes as I tried to give a flavour of what it means to be ‘celebrating life on Chatsworth Road’.

We’ve got some more talking to do after the weekend & after Matt has had a good look at the listings for the Festival. The working title for his contribution is ‘Pop Ins, Poems & Pints’ as Matt would like to pop in to a wide variety of events during the Festival, read poetry or write poetry and do some of that in a few pubs, as well. Matt was keen to follow through with the Festival & work with us again for 2012 (oh yes, we’re already looking to make the Festival an annual event).

So that’s all for now. Please show your friends & neighbours our feature in this week’s Derbyshire times & let them know about the Festival. Those who get S40local delivered should be looking for it in the next week. Those who don’t get it delivered, try www.s40local.co.uk to read a copy on-line.

Best wishes to you all: friends, neighbours & colleagues,

Deirdre Gage, Chair of the Chatsworth Road Festival Group.

Too Much To Do and Knitting Leads to Chesterfield’s Newest Festival

destinationchesterfield — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 13:36:20 +0000

The Chatsworth Road Festival celebrates life on Chatsworth Road, with 9 days of entertainment and activities. The festival which runs from the 1st to the 9th October will bring together the local community and businesses to celebrate the area where they work and live, but where did the idea come from?

This festival started off as an idea from a customer to Created Gallery, the visitor, had read about Chatsworth Road and decided to make their way down the street from one end to the other, allowing a couple of hours to do this. After a coffee and a cake in Mes Amis and purchasing gifts at Created Gallery, she had ran out of time to discover more of the road and suggested to the owner, Deirdre Gage, you should really have a festival to celebrate everything happening on Chatsworth Road, Deidre agreed.

Deidre Gage, Chair of Chatsworth Road Festival said “I took the idea to the Champagne Knitting night at Mes Amis and everyone loved the idea. So we formed a committee and started to arrange a major new festival for Chesterfield!”

The festival has numerous events happening over 9 days run by local businesses, groups and institutions with highlights including a Chatsworth Road Food Fair at St Thomas’ new Church Centre, Brampton Brewery are holding a Mini Beer Festival at the Tramway Tavern, exclusive news about Derbyshire’s Poet Laureate and a day full of activities at Brampton Manor where they also celebrate 40 years.

Meeting the new Derbyshire Poet Laureate… in secrecy!

createdgallery — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 13:33:03 +0000

We have got one big secret at the moment… & that is the identity of the new Derbyshire Poet Laureate. I can tell you that the person will be involved in the Chatsworth Road Festival in their role as Derbyshire Poet Laureate (hereafter refered to as DPL) & that it will be their first engagement as the DPL.

You probably would like to know a bit more about the DPL & the history of the post. Well here goes. The role was developed by Derbyshire County Council in 2005 to promote & raise the profile of poetry. Also it to was to celebrate Derbyshire people, places & traditions through poetry.

Over the last 6 years more than 5000 people have been involved with the Laureates. The Laureates have been River Wolton, Cathy Grindrod & Ann Atkinson with the new Laureate appointed in August this year. They will be ‘revealed’ on National Poetry Day Thursday 6th October – yes, right in the middle of our Chatsworth Road Festival but I don’t think that it will be at the Festival.

The Derbyshire Poet Laurete is an honorary position & the tenure runs for 2 years from October 2011 to September 2013. So we hope to have the DPL back with us for next year’s festival when we can use their real name instead of dpl!

I’m meeting with ‘dpl’ this afternoon to discuss how they see their role at the Chatsworth Road Festival so if you see a heavily disguised figure entering Created… don’t panic it’s either the ‘dpl’ or a customer with a strange fashion sense!

Want to join in with the Festival?

createdgallery — Sat, 03 Sep 2011 11:00:09 +0000

If you’re thinking of joining in with the Festival by organising an event then time is running out. We need details of events confirming by TUESDAY 6TH SEPT because this is the copy deadline for S40 Local. The Sept/Oct edition of S40 Local will contain the Festival Guide and be a most useful tool for taking part in Festival activities.

So if you, your group or your business want to be involved these are the details that we need:

Title of event
Date, Time & Place
Approximately 30 words to describe what the event is about
A jpeg image (not essential but would help)

Email all this to paul@s40local.co.uk and put in the subject line CHATSWORTH RD FESTIVAL EVENT.

Thanks!

Deirdre