Friends of Wray Crescent

Bring your family and friends – all welcome!

We’ll be working on the planter and borders near the playground from 2-5pm on Saturday 15 October.  We plan to tidy up the beds, add plants that will give an immediate improvement, and plant some bulbs for a bright show next spring.  We’ll provide plants, bulbs, tools and light refreshments.  All you need to do is turn up.

If you are planning to come, please let us know so we can make sure we have enough refreshments etc.

When: Saturday 15 October, 2-5pm

Where: meet at the playground, Wray Crescent open space, accessible from Thorpedale Road, Wray Crescent, and Turlewray Close.

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps/ms?msa=0&msid=216298014587168781216.0004ae51e025aa8220a8b

Update:  here’s a few photos of us digging away!

The Wray Crescent festival is over for another year.  Despite a few showers and the odd gust of wind, we all had a fantastic time, and so did all our visitors, judging from the feedback.

This word cloud summarises what people said about the festival – the more people that used a word in their feedback, the bigger it is in the picture.  People also gave us loads of suggestions for improving things, and we’re already planning ahead to see how next year’s festival can be even better.  In particular, people suggested more things to do, a wider choice of food, and better loos.  We’ll do what we can on those, but a rain-free day is probably beyond our control!

In the mean time, we are thinking about planting days for the autumn, to make our park a bit more colourful next spring.  And finally, a huge thankyou to all our stall holders, entertainers, volunteers, suppliers, park rangers, sponsors, givers of raffle prizes and of course festival visitors, for making the 2011 Wray Crescent Festival such a success.

Panto in the Park is coming to Wray Crescent.  We are very excited that our friends from Park Theatre will be at the Summer Festival to entertain us with a summer pantomime.  They will also have a stall so you can find out more about N4′s new theatre, under construction on Wells Terrace.  Catch up with the latest news on their website.

…until the Wray Crescent Festival on 18 June.

We’ve got loads of new things planned this year, including human table football, zumba, and hula-hooping workshops.  Add in our regular and hotly contested football tournament, bouncy castles and coconut shy, and you’ll definitely be needing something to calm you down: try chilling out with cute farm animals, treating yourself to a head massage, or just relaxing with a cream tea while you take in the live entertainment.

As well as being a grand day out, the Festival is a great way to meet your neighbours and local groups.  If you’d like to get involved, please get in touch via info@wraycrescent.org.  You can also come along to our next planning meeting, on Wednesday 25 May, 7.30 pm at the Library, Islington Arts & Media School.

We’d be especially keen to hear from you if you have time to help us set up in the morning.  With so many things happening we have a lot to do, so even if you can only spare an hour we’d love to hear from you.

Spring is in the air (well it was this morning, before it clouded over), and the Friends of Wray Crescent are already looking ahead to this year’s summer festival. If you live in Stroud Green, London N4, here’s how you can get involved:

Send us your feedback and suggestions: if you were at the festival last year, what did you think? We’d love to hear from you – drop us a line at info@wraycrescent.org.

Come along to our next planning meeting: 7.30pm on 21 March at the library, Islington Arts & Media School, Turle Road, N4 3LS.

Join our mailing list: maybe you can’t make the planning meeting but you’d like to get involved. Perhaps you’d be willing to help on the day of the festival (this is the English summer we are dealing with here, and there are a lot of gazebos to put up!). Email us at info@wraycrescent.org, and we’ll be in touch.

We’re still in the early stages of planning this year’s extravaganza, so to keep up with the latest developments you can follow us here, or on Twitter.

Last year we had a bouldering wall as a centrepiece for the festival and this year we’ve gone for something even more spectacular.

Bungee trampolines let you safely bounce to heights you couldn’t normally reach. The best news is both children and adults can have a go!

With a month to go, the activities at this year’s festival are being lined up.

We’ve confirmed two bouncy castles, the spaces on the five-a-side tournament are filling up. The N19 pub will be putting on a fantastic BBQ again, and you can expect to see lots of stalls full of craft activities.

There will of course be plenty of cake.

The face painting at last year’s festival was really popular. If you’d like to help us this year please get in touch. You don’t have to be Leonardo da Vinci to apply!

image with kind permission from Chris Reed

We’re busy getting on with the plans for this year’s festival. Last year was lots of fun, and the plans for this year are bigger and better.

We’ll be using this site to keep you up to date with the latest news about the festival.

Here’s a reminder of last year’s festival courtesy of Chris Reed. Press play and click the little icon on the bottom right of the gallery to view them full-screen.

If you have any shots you’d like to have featured on the site please get in touch at info@wraycrescent.org