Fair InTents - Haworth's inaugural ecofair

The weekend of 11th-12th September 2010 saw the first ever Fair InTents event held in Haworth, Yorkshire, which was an "ecofair" intended to promote Fair Trade goods, sustainable living and community action in the Haworth area.

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Haworth is a small hilly town in the Worth Valley, famous for being the home of the Brontë family (authors of Wuthering Heights etc) and now home to a thriving tourist industry around the names of these previous inhabitants. The drawing of tourists to the area has led to a big push from the residents to use this incoming footfall to promote ideas about sustainable living and in particular the supply of fairly traded goods. Pushing itself as a fair trade town, locals are actively involved in a number of projects that attempt to bring the community together around social justice and environmental issues. The culmination of this work so far was the Fair InTents event, held on the Parsons Meadow above the Bronte Museum at the top of the town.

The event attracted a wide array of support and stalls gave out information on community action, sustainable living, fair trade produce and other such things. A local craft stall included a local craftsman who rescues abandoned and damaged fiddles and violins from junk shops and then restores them back to working condition, rug making with natural materials, and of course many a cake. There was also workshops on mountain biking across the dales, woodturning with a pedal powered lathe and stonemasonry.

The Yorkshire Solar Sound collective provided a solar and bike powered stage for the weekend which proved very popular, and was played by a number of local artists on both days. Fabric brought along a tiny cinema which was also powered by renewable energy and showed short films on ecological living.

Each evening, local musicians played to a healthy crowd in the old schoolhouse, and both days of the fair attracted large crowds. The organisers hope that this will be the first of a regular annual event given the success of this years inaugural fair.

Contact email: imc-northern@lists.indymedia.org