Head to the Lancashire seaside and enjoy a vintage bike ride, a pooch parade, break dancing lessons and some seaside mini golf with a difference.
Vintage by the Sea returns to Morecambe’s seafront this weekend (Saturday 31st August and Sunday 1st September), with an abundance of arts, culture and music from the 20s to the 90s, as well as classic cars, marketplaces and RAF flypasts.
The promenade will be bustling with the best dressed visitors for a free weekend of fashion, design, music, workshops, street theatre and primped pooches.
This year the festival is expanding with the creation of original new arts projects. Three new commissions from some of the UK’s most talented emerging artists will bring a contemporary perspective to the acclaimed Vintage by the Sea festival.
Morecambe-born, Sheffield-based illustrator, musician and graphic artist Charles Kondras, will bring the iconic art school of the Bauhaus to Morecambe. Borrowing the Bauhaus motto for the title of the piece, Rethink the World will be an immersive art installation that will transform part of the The Midland Hotel car park into a modernist Bauhausian schoolroom. Visitors will be able to turn their hand to practices taught at Bauhaus itself: weaving, printing, mural painting, ceramics and woodwork.
Bristol based visual artist Jessica Akerman will create embroidered wearable patches, inspired by Morecambe Bay and the town, which together form a wearable portrait celebrating a small part of the area’s historical and environmental narratives. Akerman’s work for Vintage by the Sea is part vintage cinema usherette costume and part series of eight fabric patches, created by the artist with traditional Nottingham lace makers. The embroidered wearables will be given to festival visitors in exchange for stories they wish to share. Visitors can also take part in workshops with the artist.
Hip Hop Hooray will be in the Little Big Top, where the whole family can dance to a selection of the finest old school hip-hop classics, try a spot of break dancing and check out the talent from graffiti artists and painters from across the Northwest.
There will also be marketplaces will be selling handmade and up-cycled craft as well as a selection of mid-century modern homewares, records and clothes from the 20s to the 90s. And a boutique 32 seat Vintage Mobile Cinema will be on The Midland Green throughout the festival.
The Pooch Parade (Sunday) will see Morecambe’s most magnificent mutts strut their stuff, with new Master of Ceremonies, Paulus The Ringmaster.
Experience the Morecambe Bay Cycle Way with a Vintage Bike Ride from the back of the Midland Hotel to Happy Mount Park for tea and cake (returning for prizes). Bring your classic racer, sit up and beg or 60s shopper!
For something a little less energetic, take golf to a new level with Putt by Numbers, a new mini golf seaside special. Designed by The Exchange Creative Community with local artists and community participants, this is mini golf with a vintage twist!
The Melodrome Stage at the Promenade Gardens will be have an eclectic mix of live music throughout the weekend, and the Routemaster Bus Bar will feature DJs spinning tunes.
The Vintage by the Sea After Party brings Britain’s distinctive dance culture and DJ history to the fore by paying respect to our rich club culture and the DJs that have shaped it. Dave Haslam has DJ-ed over 450 times at the Haçienda and was DJing on the last night the Hacienda was open, 28th June 1997. A welcome return to Vintage by the Sea, he describes his eclectic dancefloor filling philosophy as playing the best records ever made one after the other.
And finally, the Classic Car Show will be rolling into Morecambe for the weekend, with vehicles including Triumphs, Morris Minors, the star vehicle from Life on Mars and a Leyland Leopard.
When: 31st August & 1st September 2019
Where: The Promenade, Morecambe, Lancashire
£: Free (the festival After Party is ticketed)
More info: www.vintagefestival.co.uk