Get ready to step into the magical world of Malarkey Park!
The Big Malarkey Festival returns to East Park on Saturday 24 and Sunday 25 June 2023 with a sixth helping of family fun to celebrate children’s books and stories.
This year’s festival theme is A Kind of Magic. We believe that books and stories contain a kind of magic – the power to take you away to another place, to introduce you to extraordinary people, animals, times, or things beyond your own world and your own imagination.
Come and explore with us!
The festival opens on Tuesday 20 June with an action-packed four day school programme, which includes the KS2 and KS3 James Reckitt Hull Children’s Book Award. Did you know Hull is the only city to run a book award with a live vote by the city’s young people?
On Saturday 24th June we’re having the best magical adventures in the Big Top.
Come and meet the author Christopher Edge and explore the ultimate Escape Room. Full of puzzles and challenges – can you solve them all before the time runs out?
Help Blue Peter Award Winning author Pamela Butchart on a super secret mission to discover the truth about the Beast in the Basement.
Join a hilarious session filled with songs, dancing, drawing and fascinating (and gross) facts with author Chae Strathie, who will be dishing the dirt on a kid’s life in a medieval castle.
We’ll invite you to get lively in the Live and Kicking tent with events suitable for all the family including a pirate adventure with Pirate Bonnie, followed by the journey of two intrepid time travellers in a race to save the world in The Old Green Time Machine and younger children can have lots of fun exploring stories, songs, music and adventures with Small Voices, Big Noises, Doug the Camel, and The Dragon with the Blazing Bottom in the Little Larkeys tent.
On Sunday 25th June the Doodle Room is THE place to be for a drawalong extravaganza!
We welcome Louie Stowell, best-selling creator of Loki: A Bad God’s Guide to…. You can learn how to draw Loki and a host of other Norse Gods, then hear all about her bestselling series.
Tit4Tat Circus will be sharing ‘The Most Dangerous Cup of Tea in the World ’around Malarkey Park. What makes it dangerous? Well, we’ve seen the risk assessment and we can guarantee you it’s an explosive and dynamic performance!
In the Big Top we’ll be having amazing time with ‘Adventures on Trains ’co-author Sam Sedgman, then welcoming Jeffrey Boakye as he introduces his first middle-grade novel, Kofi and the Rap Battle Summer.
As well as workshops, talks and performances there will be a whole host of our usual outdoor and pop-up activities including The Herd theatre company, Calvin Innes in the Doodle Room, Ian Douglas and his storytelling caravan, Rewilding Youth, Hull Maritime, Makerspace and festival favourites, Beats Bus.
We’re also excited to welcome musicians Mambo Jambo, and artists Anna Bean and Eleanor Tomlinson who all hail from Hull!
New for 2023 and available to explore all weekend – follow Alice down the rabbit-hole and into Wonderland, a fantasy world filled with peculiar characters where the unexpected is to be expected in this amazing multi-sensory adventure. Designed for people labelled with profound and multiple learning disabilities, and presented in partnership between Concrete Youth and The Big Malarkey Festival.
Tickets are available to buy online or from all branches of Hull Libraries and cost:
• £3 child (under 1yrs free) / £4 OTD
• £6 adult / £7 OTD
• £16 family tickets (2 adults + 2 children) / £20 OTD
• £5 disabled parent/guardian + 1 free carer’s ticket
Children must be accompanied by an adult. Adults must be accompanied by a child!
BUY TICKETS FOR SATURDAY 24 JUNE – https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-big-malarkey-festival-saturday-24-june-2023-tickets-646950054027
BUY TICKETS FOR SUNDAY 25 JUNE – https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-big-malarkey-festival-sunday-25-june-2023-tickets-647891018477
Get ready to step into the magical world of Malarkey Park!
The Big Malarkey Festival is produced by Hull Libraries and brings together authors and illustrators, poets, storytellers, musicians, makers and animators. It provides stacks of opportunities for children and young people to get inspired, get creative and discover the wonderful world the city’s libraries offer.
Visit the website for more information: https://thebigmalarkeyfestival.com/
