Performances at the Hat Fair in Winchester (Photo: Adrienne Photography)
When: 30th June – 2nd July 2017
Where: Winchester, Hampshire
£: Free, but donations welcome
What is it?
This year’s Winchester Hat Fair will take place from Friday 30th June to Sunday 2nd July with free performances across the city.
The event began in the 1970s as a busking festival and has grown into a three-day festival of outdoor arts which attracts performers and visitors from all over the world. This year there will be a mix of circus performances, dance, poetry, music and workshops to watch and take part in.
This year’s Hat Fair begins on Friday with an array of performances and events taking place, including The Actual Reality Arcade, an interactive zone where visitors can play games inspired by classic arcade games, and The Amazing Camera Obscura, where visitors can step back in time.
Other performances over the weekend will include a mix of Argentine tango, BSL sign language and aerial performance in Deaf Men Dancing, and a juggler with a difference who loves nothing more than a cup of tea with The Great Dave.
Balbir Singh Dance Company will see two dancers and a beatboxer bringing hopscotch to life in an unusual way. There’ll be a combination of bicycles, acrobatics, humour and songs in Les Frères TrouBouch, and physical theatre, fire, puppetry and music in Teatr Biuro Podróży’s Silence, with their story of refugees and migrants caught up in a spiral of war and a dream of escape.
Joe Riley is a Poet for Hire, and visitors will be able to request a poem based on a style and subject, and pay what they think it’s worth. Visitors will also be able to unleash their inner Billy Joel on the Hat Fair Street Pianos, which will be located outside Tom’s Deli and Winchester Train Station.
Finally, visitors will be able to take an Urban Safari, and see the environment with new eyes, as rangers guide people through the city, using their ‘all terrain scootmobile’.
More info: hatfair.co.uk