Industry News

An opportunity has opened for an experienced festival producer to help develop the next major festival for County Durham.

Durham County Council is seeking experienced cultural organisations, festival producers, creative practitioners and consortium partnerships to help develop and deliver the county’s next large-scale flagship event.

Building on the success of Lumiere, Durham Brass Festival, Durham Book Festival, Durham City Run and Bishop Auckland and Seaham Food Festivals, the council is looking to develop an event that will become a new centre piece in the culture and events calendar of the county.

The council is looking for a partner who can combine artistic excellence, innovation, community engagement and destination impact to create an event which generates lasting cultural, social, and economic value for residents, businesses and visitors alike.

Cllr Karen Allison, Durham County Council’s Cabinet member for leisure, tourism, regeneration and high street, said: “We have a significant opportunity to create an ambitious, nationally significant cultural event that will shape perceptions of County Durham for years to come. And we’re looking for the right partner to help us deliver this.

“The commissioned event should be capable of becoming a defining cultural moment for County Durham: bold in concept, ambitious in scale, participatory in nature and recognised nationally for its originality.

“We are particularly interested in ideas that bring together culture, creativity, technology, innovation, and community participation in ways that are distinctive to County Durham and cannot be replicated elsewhere.”

The flagship festival could explore a range of themes, from innovation, invention and engineering to health and wellbeing, digital futures, space and exploration, data and artificial intelligence, alongside celebrating County Durham's rich industrial, scientific and cultural heritage

Proposals should create meaningful opportunities for participation and creative learning, particularly for children and young people, ensuring that local people are not only audiences but active participants in shaping, making and delivering the event.

More information about the proposals can be found at www.open-uk.org.

Interested parties wishing to bid for the procurement must be first signed up on Open and can register their interest using the reference OPEN20261993 for 003550 - Flagship Festival 2027.