Beeston Christmas Lantern Festival 2024

We were proud to once again sponsor the Beeston Lantern Festival this year, which took place on 13th December. It was a truly wonderful event, and we’d like to share a letter from organiser Mark Hodgkinson:-

This year’s Lantern Festival was once again a huge success and was undoubtedly our biggest and best yet. Building on the model of the last 2 years, we began events with 3 local gatherings – at St Luke’s Church, Rowland Rd Working Men’s Club and St Mary Church – which involved live music, donkeys, light refreshments, craft, and, of course, lots of lights.

These events each saw between 80 and 200 people join together before processing to Cross Flatts Park with donkeys ridden by competition winners where the community all came together. Cross Flatts Park was transformed again in a bigger and better way! Lanterns lined the paths, lights strung up in trees, gazebos, fences and our new storytelling tent.

Hot food was served with hot dogs, shawarmas and samosas followed by hot drinks, mince pies and yule log. Despite catering for 700, we still ran out of food (much to the displeasure of one of our more vocal volunteers!), such was the size of the crowd that joined together from across the community in the park.

• There was a wide range of activities including:
• A trail where children needed to find the light boxes spread around the event
• Live music from 2 gospel choirs and the Cockburn Community Choir.
• Den building with Yorkshire Contemporary
• Donkey rides
• A mobile farm
• A story telling tent
• A ‘build an angel’ competition

Finally, everyone gathered for some carols led by the Salvation Army Band and a performance by the choir from St Luke’s School before 250 children went home very happy with the gift we were able to give them at the end.

Once again, feedback has been incredibly positive. One volunteer said that the Lantern Festival is now the highlight of his year and a first time attendee summed it up by saying it was ‘simply beautiful’.

It is a real honour and privilege to be involved in this event each year. And not only the event itself. It struck me again this year how the Lantern Festival is so much more than the actual event. We had over 50 volunteers throughout the day. The volunteers in the park including 8 insurance advisors doing a day of CSR, a couple of homeless guys and a whole host of others worked tirelessly all day but with constant beaming faces and a willingness to do whatever needed to be done.

The incredible beauty of these people was summed up in 2 of the volunteers buying fish and chips for everyone for lunch – an act of kindness that brought one of the other volunteers to tears. My brother-in-law, visiting for the day, said he
had never seen such an ‘eclectic group of people’ in one place in his life. There are many challenges in this community, but there is also an unrivalled spirit and many people who want to make a difference – in the spirit of Christmas, people who want to bring light into the darkness.

Overall, therefore, the event was a huge success and would not have been possible were it not for your generous support – we are very grateful and would like to say a big thank you on behalf of our core team, volunteers and everyone in the community who took part. We are now in the process of evaluating and assessing what the Christmas Lantern Festival in 2025 might look like. One of the volunteers, who happens to have a forge in his back garden is already setting about making some 2.5m steel poles because, in his words, ‘it would be nice to line the paths with festoon lights next year’. I’m excited to see where the event takes us next year.