From Roman soldiers to a Regency era ferryman, the rich history of African people in our country is a long one. A project in the North East has been researching these stories, sharing them through a range of resources and events – including a taster walk over our festival. As we couldn’t attend the walk we asked them to share a few stories here, highlighting the wonderful work they do and resource they are creating.

From a dazzling cloak to the portrait of a Curling Captain there is more to our sporting heritage than you might think. Sport is a huge part of our culture, but its place in our heritage has sometimes been overlooked. Earlier this year though we came across a brilliant network working to change that. As they lead us in celebrating National Sporting Heritage Day, their Founding Director is here to introduce their work and some amazing sporting heritage collections you can visit.

Over the festival, alongside managing the media channels and taking turns with 'helpdesk duty' it's really important for the team to see events in action. It helps us to support organisers locally and reconnect with the festival experience as visitors, to see where we might do more to help in future. From the pinkest event to pen nibs hidden in doors, here's a quick taste of where we went and what we discovered this year.