Saturday 3 November 2018

Glow Festival 2018

The Fire Garden:  this year hinting at the manor's alleged connection with the Gunpowder Plot.
The London Borough of Barking & Dagenham is very keen on upping the profile of the area and has been for some time.  There are echoes of gentrification in the various redevelopment schemes in the Barking town centre and with that has come a fair focus on the arts.  Funding, of course, is always a dilemma but it doesn't deter the enthusiasm and one such event returning for its second time in three years is the Glow Festival.

Held over two evenings in the gardens of Eastbury Manor House, an Elizabethan period property owned by the National Trust but run by the Council, it hosts illuminated art installations that literally glow in the dark - or burn as in the photo above.

I'm not going to write too much as the photos and captions speak for themselves.

The west side of Eastbury Manor, an Elizabethan building that is today used by the local community for all manner of societies and events and very much a part of the Borough's heritage.  We got married there in 2011!
A paper fish that went through a whole rainbow of colours.
One of the many installations.
Standing guard by the main entrance (out of shot to the right).
Paper Polar Bears
Er...croak...
One of several horse sculptures in the small rear courtyard on the south side of the house.
A dormouse and its nest.
One final note is that the staff and volunteers were all very enthusiastic and this year had quite a spread of food options including vegetarian, halal as well as standard British bonfire night food.  Personally, of course, I just went for the apple and berry crumble with custard.  Oh yes.

1 comment:

  1. It was a lovely evening, I'm really glad we went. And not just for the berry crumble!

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