Nottingham Puppet Festival to make a triumphant return in May

After taking 2019 off, Nottingham Puppet Festival will be back for only its second ever running from 16^th May 2020, entertaining local families for a month with a packed schedule of walkabouts, workshops and performances.

The first edition of the festival in 2018 attracted more than 23,000 people, and organisers have signalled that this year’s offering will be both bigger and better than the spectacular debut.

What can this spring’s visitors expect?

The 2020 Nottingham Puppet Festival is being made possible by close work with a wide range of organisations, including Nottingham City Council, Nottingham Playhouse, Broadway Cinema, New Art Exchange and ChalleNGe Nottingham, to name just a few.

Such collaborations will enable another showcase of some of the UK’s finest puppetry, courtesy of Half a String, Little Angel, Ditto Theatre Company and Norwich Puppet Theatre.

Walkabouts, hip hop, and even a puppetry symposium

While the complete festival programme won’t be launched until the beginning of April, the Nottinghamshire Live website has cited among the expected highlights puppet walkabouts in Old Market Square, as well as a unique combination of hip hop and puppetry at Breakin’ Convention at the Royal Concert Hall. In addition, there will be puppetry talks and a national puppetry symposium at Nottingham Trent University.

A new outdoor show will also be produced by City Arts, featuring festival mascot Maid Marionette, while bursaries will also be made available to support local artists in the creation of new work.

It is, however, the giant outdoor musical spectacular, JINGAH!, that will be the festival’s centrepiece event over the weekend of Saturday 6^th and Sunday 7^th June. It’ll all happen in Old Market Square, which is set to be graced by larger than life-size puppets, along with acrobatic musicians and singers from around the world.

It promises to be something extremely special indeed

With JINGAH! being a newly written, environmentally-themed production supported by Arts Council England, it is just one of the many aspects of the upcoming festival that shows this will be a month of activities relevant well beyond the world of puppetry.

As for what you may do in the meantime... well, why not take the time to browse our extensive range of beautifully made and designed, but also reasonably-priced puppets and accessories here at Puppets By Post?

Whether you're specifically on the lookout for The Puppet Company hand puppets, or instead the likes of animal, character and people puppets – to name just some of our popular categories – our online store will remain well-stocked throughout the coming months. We're here to serve your needs as a parent, guardian, teacher or puppetry enthusiast or professional!