This year’s De Frene Summer Festival was another hugely successful event for Sydenham Garden thanks to over 360 visitors who very generously spent over £3500 on our stalls, food and refreshments. As with all our events, all money raised goes to support our work helping local people attending our projects.
There were activities and games for children and adults to enjoy from making suncatchers; pond dipping; bouquet tying and even a human fruit machine!
Visitors were able pick-up a bargain from one of the stalls run by Sydenham Garden groups including our Art & Craft; African & Caribbean Group and MUD projects as well as our Activities Clubs. All items for sale, which included cards; T-shirts; tea bags; jewellery; a cookery book and a range of knitted items were all handmade by co-workers, volunteers and staff during project sessions. The Plant sale was as popular as ever.
The food court served a tasty range of food from a delicious sweet potato & chickpea tagine and a selection from the BBQ. We also had lots of lovely homemade cakes and biscuits on offer, baked by members of our wider community. Honey from our very own beehives at De Frene was available but you had to be quick as this sold out very quickly.
Visitors were able to sing along with or dance to some great live music courtesy of the following fantastic local musicians:
Squawkers & Strummers
Martin Howard
Endurance
The Gillies
Rita Tam
As in previous years we welcomed several local businesses with Andrea and Vivien selling a lovely range of items including jewellery and handmade bags; Karen and Florence put together a children’s tombola and Cat was on hand if you wanted your face painted.
Many thanks must also go to the Sydenham Garden team of who helped on the day and in the weeks running up to the festival to make items for sale, bake cakes, prepare and cook food, run activities and set up stalls. Without your dedication and enthusiasm, we wouldn’t be able to put on a De Frene Summer Festival.
Our next fundraising event will be our annual Winter Fair at the Resource Centre, watch out for more information on our website.
All festival photographs © Barney Gibbons (@_barneygibbons)
