You're invited to the 3rd Leighton Buzzard Fun Palace event!

For the third year running, Totally Leighton Buzzard is organising a free Leighton Buzzard Fun Palace taking place on Saturday 7 October from 10am to 4pm at the Leighton Buzzard Town Cricket Club.

As ever, the event will be an eclectic mix of participatory activities. Activities expected to happen at this year's Fun Palace are drypoint printing, lacemaking, geology, pickleball, music and hopefully a "language cafe" table and foreign language book sale and more.

Sadly some people have had to drop out at last minute, but we are still hoping for a great event because Fun Palaces is eclectic and there is no set way of organising or holding and it depends on people's engagement and participation on the day. So its not too late to be involved to lead an activity.

This event is part of Fun Palaces 2023 which is a free, nationwide campaign for culture at the heart of community and community at the heart of culture, with the annual Weekend of Celebration held on 6th – 8th October 2023.

Each Fun Palace celebrates the unique skills and passions of local people – run by, for and with the local community. Since 2014 over 45,000 people have made 2500 Fun Palaces with 800,000 people taking part. This year marks the 10th anniversary of the Fun Palaces Weekend of Celebration.

Fun Palaces was originally inspired to be a "a laboratory of fun, a university of the streets" - a radical place in the vision of the former theatre director, Joan Littlewood (1914-2002). She imagined a space where people would "Choose what you want to do - or watch someone else doing it.

Learn how to handle tools, paint, babies, machinery or just listen to your favourite tune. Dance, talk or be lifted up to where you can see how other people make things work. Sit out over space with a drink and tune in to what's happening elsewhere in the city. Try starting a riot or beginning a painting - or just lie back and stare at the sky".

A Fun Palace event is space to bring together arts, science, craft, tech, digital, heritage and sports activities – but above all people of all ages and backgrounds – to work together, create together, have FUN together, and in doing so, connect our own communities, from the grassroots up.

Fun Palaces are about building connections and about the process and possibility of creating a grassroots community event that is totally inspired and led locally - yes on a shoestring and single-handedly by one person - but that doesn't matter.

Whatever your hidden skills, interests or hobbies please get involved.

If you love the idea of Fun Palaces and want to help make it even better in 2024 then get in touch and get involved with Totally Leighton Buzzard by contacting us via email at [email protected] or via Facebook or Instagram.