Take 5 with the Team

Lockdown – The station and the fields

Soon after lockdown began the team had to leave HODs HQ, and we still haven’t been back. The office attic is gathering dust, a tin of tea sits atop my locker awaiting my return, but the home office cupboards are well stocked, and the dining room desk is doing sturdy service. For 2 months, my colleagues, the A team (Andy + Alex) were sent out to tend the frustrating fields of furlough, while I did my best to hold the festival’s home station alongside our comms crew. It was a strange time but hosting a series of online ‘Community Cafes’ connected us to local organisers across the country in a new way. Checking in and chatting with friends old and new was all the joy and inspiration needed to keep the festival engine ticking over, ready for…

Relaunch – relighting the fire

After months of carefully monitoring government guidance and conversations with the community, we were ready to recall the A team and prepare a new timetable for the festival. Alex’s eagle eyes honed in on reworking our database for a revised festival format, while Andy pulled together a new guidance pack for organisers in record time to introduce the idea of going digital. After a frantic fortnight we did it, registration has reopened, and the festival train is back on the tracks, ready to roll out of the station once more. With 49 submissions before the email had even reached the whole community, it looks set to be a great ride!

So what happens now?

As ever, local people and their stories are the heart of our festival, and we’re doing everything we can to help highlight them. Right now we’re setting up webinars to help organisers plan and tweaking the website ready for showcasing these new-look events from late summer. It’s not about all the bells and whistles though. It’s not about having the most glamorous place, or the snazziest tech (though they’re welcome too!). It’s about bringing people together (even if we have to be apart) to share their stories– it’s about discovering something new, about something you thought you knew. The gates are open, come join the ride, we want to hear your story - where will it take us next?!

Find out more

• HODs Quiz - Test your trivia with 9 nuggets of local knowledge shared by the festival community in lockdown
• Festival Spotlights - Want some event inspiration? Check out last year’s Festival Spotlights
• Got a story/place to share? - Find out how you can join our festival community
• Newsletter - Sign up for regular updates on the festival and beyond
• Read more on the blog - Look out for ‘Take 5 with the team’ posts in our Blog stream
• Meet the team