Gloucester History Festival
GUST took on the co-ordination of the Gloucester History Festival in partnership with the founder Richard Graham and the existing organising committee in 2016 with the intention of using the expertise and networks of its trustees to support the growth and development of the Festival. The Committee was chaired by Richard Graham MP, and engaged many other local bodies including Gloucester Civic Trust, Gloucester City Council (Blackfriars, Museum of Gloucester, the Guildhall, Museum of Life), Marketing Gloucester, Gloucestershire Archives, Discover DeCrypt and Gloucester Cathedral.
Over the course of two years, GUST successfully raised the aspirations and ambition of Gloucester History Festival from a local history festival into an event now identified as a city-wide flagship festival with potential to be the UK’s leading history festival. GUST worked with the History Festival Committee to build a creative strategy, identified and highlighted the potential that working directly with local community arts organisations could have in producing a truly unique history festival, engaging local people to contribute to developing a sense of place by reflecting their own heritage. We brought in expert staff in particular Sarah Smyth former Artistic Director of Cheltenham Literature Festival, nurtured relationships with leading historians as advocates, including Dr Janina Ramirez as Festival President and then supported the History Festival volunteers to set themselves up as a CIO.
We managed budgets of £80,000 and successfully fundraised for activities from local businesses and trusts and ensured that the History Festival’s potential was recognised as part of the Great Place funding award to the City. Over the course of two years audiences for the festival tripled as did income in fundraising with high-profile speakers such as David Olusoga, Jung Chang, Alice Roberts, Griff Rhys Jones attracting sell-out audiences.
