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With over three thousand visitors and a healthy sales sheet, this year’s Sculpture Garden must be rated a resounding success. Over 120 exhibits from 31 sculptors were artfully arranged around the beautiful Odney Club grounds by the The Sculpture Garden’s curator, Lucy Irvine. The weather played a major part in determining numbers of visitors: from […]

Cookham’s Holy Trinity Church Eucharist service was transformed on Sunday 14th May with the introduction of jazz before, during and after the service. Parishoners were welcomed to the Festival Jazz Eucharist by Cookham’ favourite jazz band – the Fabulous Shirt-lifters, who added a joyous note as the church filled up. During the service the boys, […]

REVIEW OF THE STRICTLY COOKHAM DANCE PROGRAMME   After having run a Beginners Ballroom and Latin class at two Cookham Festivals I decided to broaden the scope and offer classes in other forms of dance at the 2017 festival. I also changed the time of the classes to the evening to give working people the […]

The Judges of the competition are delighted to announce the results of the competition as follows: The Don and Jill Cawthorne Prize, with a cash prize of £2,500 Rosie Jackson – “The Heaven That Runs Through Everything” The Stationers’ Company Award, with a cash prize of £500 Ross Cogan – “Zacharias and Elizabeth” The Maidenhead […]

The pews of Holy Trinity Church in Cookham were filled with local people who had come to enjoy this final concert in the 2017 Festival. Some of them might have been in the audience 50 years ago when the Festival series started, and they certainly included the Wood family, who had heard the Mozart piece […]

Or Guess the name of the caterpillar at the Crazy Tea-Party at the Tarrystone   When the Cookham Knit and Natter Group came up with the idea of dressing the Tarrystone again for the Cookham festival’s 50th anniversary, it was a golden opportunity to add a little bit of fun to the proceedings. Visitors to […]

Cookham’s Place in the Movies   The festival’s film night on the 16th May in Cookham Dean Village Hall recalled memories of famous names and heart throbs from the big screen. In the first part of the evening, Richard Poad, a local expert and Chair of The Maidenhead Heritage Centre, took the audience on a […]

The John Lewis Design Legacy: Talk by Camilla Honey   Camilla Honey explained to a sell-out audience at the John Lewis Heritage Centre that she was responsible for the design and creation of the Heirloom children’s clothes collection on sale at John Lewis stores. Heirloom is a premium range aimed at 4 to 14 year […]

I wanted to go to this event from the minute I heard it was being held as part of the Festival. However, when I thought about it, I didn’t really know much about Ross Kemp. Like many people, I just thought of him as ‘that guy who’s a bit of a thug on East Enders…with […]

“PEEPS INTO PANTO” – SUPPER AND ENTERTAINMENT   Three events for the price of one! Guests first had the opportunity to sip a drink as they browsed through the comprehensive collection of Cookham Pantomime memorabilia. “John Brookes hasn’t changed a bit in all those years”. “My God, there’s James in the Chorus!” “They made an […]

The Festival Arts Hub Over the weekend of 13th/14th May, the Parish Centre was transformed into a hothouse of artistic endeavour covering a wide range of different art activities that had been specifically selected with adults and children in mind. Four local professional artists ran a series of engaging, hands-on workshops and 80 festival goers […]

Glass, Architecture and Art: Talk by Kirsty Brooks Kirsty Brooks enthralled her full-house audience with her knowledge, enthusiasm and talent as she took them through a whistle-stop tour of the evolution of glass making from the Romans to present time. She explained that this evolution massively accelerated following the revolution that was the manufacture of […]

The Flower Festival celebrating fifty years of the Cookham Festival was a truly amazing experience. Fifty golden display titles were chosen either to reflect the celebration, selecting items from the programmes through the fifty years, recognising the poems and plays, authors and artists, Cookham institutions, cricket, panto, Tarrystone, Cantorum, Elizabeth House, Rock the Moor and […]

Cookham Bells ring in the Festival 2017   A full peal was rung on Cookham bells to launch the first Cookham Festival in 1967. To mark the 50th anniversary the Cookham bells, now 10 in number, rang again on Saturday 13th May. The peal, which took 2 hours 58 minutes to ring, consisted of 5003 […]

Come and Sing with Russell Scott on Sunday May 14th saw a disparate group of over 30 people attending the Odney Club for a choral workshop. To achieve his ends Russell employs humour, anecdotes and above all an infectious enthusiasm for music. With this mixture he was able to create an amazingly professional sound. The […]

Cookham and its Brewing History: Talk by Keith Parry   After thirty years research experience in the agrochemical industry, Keith retired to develop his interest in history gaining a Diploma and then an M.Sc. in English Local History at Oxford University. His new research took him and his sell-out audience at Cookham Dean Cricket Club […]

The Cookham Festival Stanley Spencer Poetry Competition. Poetry Reading. Cookham Dean Village Hall, Friday 12 May. The competition attracted over 200 entries from not just all over the UK, but also from the United States, New Zealand, Australia and countries in Europe. The Judging Panel, chaired by Professor Peter Robinson and supported by poet Jane […]

What an inspirational and motivational evening from Tom Aggar and Adrian Moorhouse! We were given great insight into the triggers, motivation and role models (and stubbornness!) that led these two sportsmen to set and reach their goals and win the ultimate gold medal. During this candid presentation in an intimate setting we learned of their […]

      Here’s what the audience of the People’s Shakespeare had to say about their ‘The Hollow Crown’ production…“We saw the original production of The Hollow Crown back in the 1960’s and so it was a real treat to travel a number of miles to see this production, which was every bit as entertaining […]

Cookham Library was chosen to host the entries for the Cookham festival’s painting competition. The resulting free exhibition showed what a huge wealth of creative artistic talent exists amongst us – with an extremely high standard of entries encapsulating every conceivable aspect of Cookham and its surroundings. Views from afar, from close up, beautiful scenes, […]

Celebrating the Cookham Festival’s 50th anniversary and kindly sponsored by The Shanly Foundation, the large and colourful art installation that graces Cookham Moor throughout the period of the festival has been created by students at BCA (Berkshire College of Agriculture). The brief was to ensure the completed work should have a high visual impact from […]

Community Room, Cookham Library, High Road SL6 9JF May 12th Adults £5, 11-18 years £3, U11 years free Hand in pictures 2:00pm – 5:00pm.