Following on from the success of last year’s Great Pumpkin Festival in Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, Sand In Your Eye and our partner Hebden Royd Town Council were determined to make the 2018 pumpkin carving extravaganza even bigger and better!
Hebden Bridge, our hometown, is well known for being full of creative people and is famous for it’s festivals and family events, which attract a lot of visitors into the town. It’s always a great family day out in Yorkshire. We were keen to have an event that would take place over a much wider area, encouraging families to explore the town further than the usual touristy bits. We also wanted to get the town itself involved, with local shops, pubs, cafes and businesses making spooky and ghostly displays in their windows and schools and community groups including Scout Road Academy, Hebden Royd Primary, Heptonstall Junior, Infant & Nursery School, Hebden Bridge Private Day Nursery, the Woodcraft Folk, Mytholmroyd Scouts, the WI, Happy Valley Pride, and Hebden Bridge Arts Festival, getting together to make outdoor scenes of pumpkins made by their members.
In the weeks leading up to the Great Pumpkin Festival, Hebden Bridge, we held pumpkin carving workshops in our studio so the businesses and groups could pick up some tips on how to carve 3d Halloween pumpkins. We were really pleased with how many Yorkshire folk wanted to get involved and how excited they were about the Pumpkin Festival and Halloween. All of the pumpkin displays they ended up creating were incredibly eye catching and really added to the atmosphere of the event, it was really impressive how creative people could be and how many different ways they came up with to decorate a pumpkin.
The day started off cold and bright, wrapped up in our hats and scarves, we set up all the pumpkins around Hebden Bridge. There would be several displays, across town, in a wide variety of settings, of pumpkins in silly and funny poses. Our wonderful friends at Hebden Bridge Rotary Club were on hand to guide people around town and give out maps. If you found all the displays you could enter a prize draw to win the fantastic Hebden Bridge Halloween Hamper, a hamper absolutely jam packed with goodies and prizes kindly donated by businesses across Hebden Bridge. There was a buzzing atmosphere and it was great to see so many people and families excitedly running all over town looking for them.
As well as a tightrope walking pumpkin, a pumpkin floating in an inflatable in the marina by the Rochdale Canal, a group of pumpkins fishing by the Town Hall, some film fans sat on the steps of the Picture House, and a vegetarian cannibal pumpkin outside Green’s Vegetarian Café we had a large display in the Memorial Gardens sponsored by Yorkshire Water. They currently have a campaign running to educate people on what should or shouldn’t be flushed down your toilet or poured down your sink “Flushing Wipes Blocks Pipes!” It was interesting and at times hilarious to think of how we could illustrate this with pumpkin carving, but I think our pumpkin on the toilet got the message across and lots of people wanted to take a selfie with it!
There was professional pumpkin carving taking place in St George’s Square with a live carve – this always had a crowd around it as the day progressed and a gnarly, warty, cackly witches face emerged from the giant Halloween pumpkin, everyone had questions and wanted to chat with our pumpkin artists.
Halloween is obviously a family event and with it being October half term there would be a lot of people looking for things to do with the kids, the Pumpkin Festival did not disappoint – Sand In Your Eye and their talented team spent the day holding free pumpkin carving workshops where families and kids could learn how to carve a pumpkin or could try decorating it and then enter it in a pumpkin carving competition.
If you wanted a different kind of Halloween event, in the Town Hall you could join in free family workshops to learn how to become a zombie! Local musician Brian Acton and his band The Black Sheikhs led childrens workshops to show you how to dress like a zombie, how to paint your face to look like a zombie and then how to walk and dance like a zombie – this all ended in a very spooky parade as the newly suited and booted zombies marched through town!
- The zombie parade
- The zombies assemble in the square
- March of the undead – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Dare you join the zombie parade? – Credit: Craig Shaw
If all this excitement was too much, there were plenty of opportunities to relax, grab some food from the many food stalls and listen to some music courtesy of Hebden Radio, who as well as playing music and announcing the Halloween events going on throughout the day, programmed an afternoon of incredible local music including Ruby O’Hare, Birds & Beasts and the always popular Bazzmatazz – who performed not once, not twice but three times that day in locations around Hebden Bridge with their special Halloween dance medley “Walking in the Scare”, which featured lots of Halloween music and some very scary snowmen and women.
- Eyes to the right! – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Strike a pose! – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Too scary! – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Scary snowman – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Zombie snowman dance – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Reach out – Credit: Craig Shaw
A great place to chill out and take everything in was the Enchanted Teepee, kindly donated by a local company, it was a really cool, large space with straw bales to sit on where you could see everything that was going on. They also hire out their teepees for events, parties and weddings. Actress and story teller Ursula Holden-Gill led Hebden Bridge themed ghost walks throughout the day and evening for children and adults.
As the day drew to a close, the zombies left the Town Hall and made their lurching, staggering way to the Memorial Gardens, led by stilt walking musicians. Once everyone was there the winners of the pumpkin carving competitions were announced by Hebden Royd Mayor Cllr Dr Carol Stow, as well as the winner of the pumpkin trail and the Hebden Bridge Halloween Hamper and the best retail display, which was deservedly won by Heart Gallery who made an amazing painted pumpkin display outside their gallery featuring a Frida Kahlo pumpkin – this also fitted in very nicely with Hebden Bridge Arts Festival’s Weekend of Wonderful Women, which was running at the same time. The Black Sheikhs then got off their stilts, picked up their instruments and as night fell, rocked the huge crowds of happy people.
- The Black Sheikhs closed the event with a spooktacular gig – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Zombie band – Credit: Craig Shaw
It was a wonderful, busy day, despite the cold weather and the train strikes. Hebden Bridge was full of families and visitors to the town having fun. We would like to thank Hebden Royd Town Council (especially Emma Green, Jason Boom, Rebekah Cox, and Mayor Cllr Dr Carol Stow), Yorkshire Water, Hebden Bridge Rotary Club, Enchanted Teepees, Hebden Radio, Brian Acton & Black Sheikhs, Bazzmatazz, Ruby O’Hare, Birds & Beasts, Ursula Holden-Gill, Gordon Rigg’s, St John’s Ambulance, Craig Shaw Photography, Bezmond, Calderdale Metropolitan Borough Council, all our volunteers, all the local shops, bars, cafes, pubs and businesses of Hebden Bridge that came to our workshops, took part in the festival, donated prizes, and gave their support, as well as all the amazing people of Hebden Bridge and visitors and participants in the pumpkin carving workshops and zombie parade.
- Pugkin – Credit: Craig Shaw
- One of Hebden Bridge’s great bookshops – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Roll up! Roll up! – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Zombie band – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Fishing in the sunshine – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Schools and community groups also took part – Credit:Craig Shaw
- You had to explore town to find all the pumpkin displays to win a prize – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Two of our partners; Yorkshire Water and Enchanted Teepees – Credit: Craig Shaw
- I think Gordon Riggs sold out of pumpkins this year! – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Some kids are too good at this – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Zombie kids – Credit: Craig Shaw
- The Heart Gallery Frida Kahlo pumpkin worked for the Arts Festival’s Weekend of Wonderful Women too! – Credit: Craig Shaw
- The horn section – Credit: Craig Shaw
- The family that zombies together… – Credit: Craig Shaw
- Bewitching – Credit: Craig Shaw
- The pumpkin carving competition – Credit: Craig Shaw
- The Yorkshire Water scene in the Memorial Gardens
- Sitting pretty
- The Enchanted Teepee was a great place to chill out
- Floating in the marina
- Taking it easy
- A high wire act
- The shipping forecast is for pumpkins. Lots of pumpkins.
- The Hebden Bridge Rotary Club were a fantastic help on the day
- Where to go?
- warts and all
- A lovely autumnal day
- Pumpkin carving workshops
- The view from below
- Found number 7!
- Every tightrope walker’s worst nightmare
- On the bog
- Heart Gallery’s fantastic display
- The Black Sheikhs played specially written music
- Raaaaah!!
- Boo!
- Bang on the drum
- I think I’ve got one!
- Brooms
- Walkers are welcome in Calderdale, even pumpkin walkers
- Everybody took part
- The memorial gardens
- Here they come
- An excellent likeness
- Painting pumpkins
- The zombies assemble in the square
- Dangling
- All afloat
- Film fans
- yum yum!
- The Black Sheikhs led the parade
- The cinema steps
- The Enchanted Teepee was a great place to chill out
- A Yorkshire Pumpkin
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