Hyndburn's celebration of all things green and environmentally friendly!
EcoFest 2024 - Saturday 8th June 2024
We're excited to announce that EcoFest will be returning to Broadway in Accrington town centre on Saturday 8th June 2024, from 10am – 3pm. The FREE festival will be even bigger and better this year as PROSPECTS celebrates its 25-year anniversary of environmental action in Hyndburn.
As well as showcasing all things green and environmentally friendly, the festival will be packed full of free activities and entertainment to appeal to all ages and interests. These include a live brass band, the Lancashire Wallopers clog dancers, Dhol Drillerz Indian drummers, live musicians, free face painting and henna art, stilt walkers, storytime sessions with Burnley Youth Theatre, clothes swop stall, spoon carving demos, make your bird box workshops, plus all you need to know about getting involved with green spaces in the borough!
There will be free art workshops where you can craft a butterfly puppet, try out weaving using recycled materials, make a suncatcher from recycled plastic and make flowers from recycled cardboard.
The Lancashire Wildlife Trust, RSPB, Ribble Rivers Trust, Woody (Hyndburn) CIC, Soil Association, Community Rail, PROSPECTS Community Energy (Coach Road Solar Meadow), Cambodia Crafts, Be-Nu Massage with Missions, Accrington and Rossendale College, Hyndburn Council, Cosy Homes in Lancashire and more will have stalls, and the PROSPECTS Foundation will have their own stalls with giveaways, demonstrations, and fun activities on how people can reduce their impact on the climate and environment.
Save the date in your diaries and don’t miss out on this free and family-friendly event!
If you'd like to help out at EcoFest 2024 as a volunteer, please email info@prospectsfoundation.org.uk or call us on (01254) 230348.
We hope to see you there!
Thank you to our EcoFest 2024 sponsors: Hyndburn Borough Council, the Windfall Fund, the UK Government Levelling Up Fund and PPL PRS.
EcoFest 2023 - Saturday 17th June
We would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who came to EcoFest 2023! This year's celebration of all things green and environmentally friendly was bigger and better, with more stalls, family-friendly entertainment and involvement from local schools.
Thank you to all the stall holders at the festival, including Ribble Rivers Trust, Lancashire Wildlife Trust, Lancashire Badger Group, Woody (Hyndburn) CIC, GoVelo, Hyndburn Borough Council, Community Rail, Lancashire Volunteer Partnership, East Lancs Beekeepers, Share Energy, Cambodia Crafts, the Food Pantry, Active Lancashire, Move 2 Change, Civic Arts Centre, Yorkshire Circus, Chatting Chimers CIC, Open Source Arts, Babbling Vagabonds, Create Yourself, Danielle Kay Medical Herbalist, Ian Smith Marquetry, Owen Jones Oak Swills, Little Vegan, Mrs Dowson's and TurtleBee.
Attendees from Hyndburn and beyond were treated to a day packed with entertainment from the Blackburn Festival of Light Band, Liam Paul acoustic guitar covers, the St. Christopher's School Trash-ion show, Desi Nach bollywood dancers, Haslingden Brass Band and the St. Christopher's School puppet show.
There was also a family-friendly performance at the Oswaldtwistle Civic Arts stall, stilt walkers, face-painting, henna, bird-house making, a bug-hotel workshop at the PROSPECTS stand and much more! Visitors also received free goody bags filled with lots of exciting content and freebies such as trolley tokens, hand woven bracelets and wildflower seed packets.
There were also sweets and eco-friendly goods for sale from TurtleBee, raffle prizes from Cosy Homes in Lancashire, and a visit from Hyndburn's new Mayor and Mayoress.
The participation from local schools this year was phenomenal! St. Christopher's School took to the main stage with their Trash-ion show, modelling pieces of clothing made from rubbish and donated goods. Some of the highlights included a dress made from Holland's pie wrappers and another made from COVID-19 face masks. The art department also showcased their fantastic puppet show, which told a story about defeating a greedy oil king!
There was also an eco-themed scavenger hunt trail, featuring A-boards that have been beautifully decorated by schools and community groups. These were judged by an independent panel of judges, with the top 3 schools receiving a cash prize. All the schools did an excellent job, with the top 3 prizes going to Intack Primary School, Baxenden St. John's CE Primary School and St. Andrew's CE Primary School.
For those who missed out, we still have our organic cotton and fairtrade tote bags and postcards for sale. These bags and postcards have been beautifully decorated with Hyndburn wildflowers, chosen by the PROSPECTS team and illustrated by the amazing Rebecca Chesney from The Super Slow Way. The tote bags are £10 and the postcards are £5 for the full set (8 cards). Pop into the PROSPECTS Foundation office at 54 Broadway, Accrington to purchase them. All proceeds go towards funding our environmental work in Hyndburn!
To ensure that we can run the event again in future, we need your feedback to relay to our funders that the festival was a success. We would be grateful if you could complete this short survey. Alternatively, you can pop into our office on Broadway to fill out the form. There is a section at the end of the form to give us any recommendations/comments that you would like to make.
We hope you enjoyed EcoFest 2023! We look forward to hearing your feedback.
And finally, a huge thanks to our EcoFest 2023 sponsors: Hyndburn Borough Council, National Lottery Heritage Fund, Onward Homes, The Ernest Cook Trust, The Windfall Fund, Nineveh Trust, and the Green Recovery Challenge Fund.
EcoFest 2022 - 13th August 2022
Thanks to everyone that came along to Eco Fest 2022! The sun was shining for our celebration of all things green and environmentally friendly - take a look at some of the event photos and video below.
Thanks to all the stall holders at the festival, including Ribble Rivers Trust, RSPB, Lancashire Wildlife Trust, Lancashire Badger Group, Woody (Hyndburn) Community Interest Company, Go Velo cycling, Greenpeace, Hyndburn Council, Community Rail, Twigs magazine, Church and Oswaldtwistle Rotary Club, East Lancs Beekeepers, Share Energy, Cambodia Crafts, Create Yourself, the Energy Guys, Chorley Nissan electric vehicles, Acorn Woodcraft, Community Food Hub, the Baby Bank, Snowdrop Doula and the Food Pantry.
Also thanks to all the performers that entertained us with some brilliant music: Johnny Elvis, Haslingden brass band, Blackburn Festival of Light samba band, Liam Paul acoustic covers and Northern Dholis bhangra drummers.
And finally thanks to all the volunteers that helped out too.
If you couldn’t make it on the day, please pop into our Environment Centre at 54 Broadway, Accrington for a free festival goody bag (while stocks last!) and more information on our environmental work in Hyndburn.
With a big thanks to the Eco Fest 2022 funders: The Ernest Cook Trust, EnergieKontor Windfall Fund, Hyndburn Borough Council and Onward Homes.