Decision details

Charivari Day 2019 –

Charivari Day Carnival is a significant community event that actively engages around 600 local children and adults in creating costumes for a colourful, musical parade through Folkestone on 6 July. The event involves many weeks of preparation making costumes, which is facilitated by Strange Cargo. Local primary schools take part in a teachers masterclass and there are sessions with older secondary school students to learn about design and making techniques to create spectacular carnival costumes. There are public workshops and artist training opportunities.  The free event attracts a very large audience from across the district and a major community event for local people.

2019 is the 23rd Charivari Day and this year’s theme is ‘A night at the movies’. The event is an inclusive community carnival that has been taking place annually in Folkestone since 97.  Primary School children will make many 100’s of costumes in school, following inset training for teachers, who take a kit of materials back to their students to prepare for the event. Secondary school students come to Strange Cargo’s base in Cheriton where they will learn a wealth of valuable skills including costume design, how to build big structures, team working, use of hand tools and working with new materials.  They then take part in the spectacular carnival event, where they have the opportunity to show off their work and enjoy taking credit for making beautiful and extraordinary carnival costumes in front of thousands of people from the Folkestone community.

To provide funding of £250 to the above project.

Reason for decision:

The event has become an embedded tradition for Folkestone, a colourful, fun and entertaining carnival and music programme that attracts thousands of local people and visitors. It is a rites of passage for the young people taking part. We have teachers, artists and parents involved in Charivari now that were children in previous events, which is a wonderful legacy for all involved.