This year’s Hampstead Summer Festival is set to be bigger and better than ever with an art fair, family garden party, and the welcome return of the Big Fair in Heath Street.
This year's activities run over four days between June 23 and July 7.
Festivities kick off at noon on June 23 with a free art fair in Keats Grove featuring colourful canvasses on the theme of Trees. The Art Street is painted by local schools and artists and supervised by Isabel Langtry, principal of Hampstead School of Art.
She said: “You will already have a smile on your face when you meet the festival’s opener at the art fair in the garden of Keats House, Jama Elmi, dubbed London’s Best Dressed Man and now also London’s Most Stylish Man, dressed in one of his trademark colourful suits, coordinating tie, hat and cane. Your smile will broaden even further when you see the beautiful pictures, pottery, jewellery, and scarves on offer."
The second event is an open-air, family-friendly performance of Much Ado About Nothing in Keats House Garden on June 25 and 26 at 7pm. The professional actors of the Moving Parts Theatre Company staged an in-the-round performance of Macbeth last year, and now offer a comedy for a balmy summer evening.
Audiences can enjoy wine and food while sitting on the lawn in the grounds of the museum.
Next up is the free Family Garden Party on Sunday June 30, with children's entertainment ranging from chase a pirate and rhyme time, to a magician, face painters and a ballet performance on the lawn with tea and cakes available as refreshments.
The whole festival ends with the Big Fair in Heath Street which draws thousands each year to enjoy around 100 stalls selling international food and drink and designer crafts.
The day also features fairground rides, a circus school, and live entertainment supplied by Hampstead’s bands on the music stage from 12pm to 5pm.
Els Bauer, chair of the festival committee said: "The gardens of Keats House are looking lovely, so it’s wonderful to have the Art Fair, Shakespeare performances and the Family Garden Party in such a pretty space again, followed of course, by our traditional Big Fair finale in Heath Street."
Further details at www.hampsteadsummerfestival.com
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