"The 64th Cattistock Show in Dorset's rolling hills hosts horses, ponies, dogs and the home of the Dorset Knob Throwing Championship, a contest involving hard biscuits, distance and great dignity that defies easy explanation."
Cattistock Countryside Show
✦ Weird & Wonderful"Over 100 events in 8 days on the Jurassic Coast, with a Wild West theme for 2026, a carnival procession, air display, fireworks finale, Titan the Robot, Granny Turismo shopping trolley dancers and open water swimming, all free and raising £40k for local charities."
Swanage Carnival Week
"Hosted by actor Martin Clunes on his West Dorset farm near Beaminster, Buckham Fair is a classic countryside show fundraiser featuring heavy horses, dog shows, main ring displays and a funfair."
Buckham Fair
"An open-air Shakespeare company performing since 1964, now staged in the purpose-built amphitheatre at Canford School near Wimborne, with The Tempest on the programme and a picnic lawn under Dorset skies."
Brownsea Open Air Theatre
"A two-day Dorset show on the August hillsides above Blackmore Vale, where the landscape itself is the argument for attending: old breeds in the ring, and Thomas Hardy countryside rolling away on every side."
Gillingham and Shaftesbury Show
"A working farm field below the silhouette of Corfe Castle. Five stages, four days, and the particular quiet of the Dorset hills when the music stops between sets."
Purbeck Valley Folk Festival
"One of the South West's premier agricultural exhibitions, held at the West Bay showground near Bridport with livestock, horses, homecrafts, horticulture and over 400 trade stands."
Melplash Agricultural Show
"A long-running west Dorset agricultural show on the coast near Bridport with livestock and food halls."
Melplash Show
"Free live folk, shanty singing and ceilidh dancing tumble along the seafront of a Jurassic Coast town, anchored by headline concerts at the Marine Theatre."
Lyme Folk Weekend
"A small and cherished late-August fete in one of Dorset's quietest hill villages, combining the Gardening Club's annual show with stalls, homemade teas and the particular peace of a village afternoon that has barely changed in decades."
Halstock Fete
"Two September days on the showground at Dorchester with the county at full stretch: livestock from the Purbeck coast and the vale, local cider, local cheese, and Dorset going about its business with its customary lack of fuss."
Dorset County Show
"The biggest dance festival in the UK brings over two hundred Morris and dance performances and fifty plus bands to fill a Dorset seaside town with colour and music."
Swanage Folk Festival
"The Monday after October 10th brings a centuries-old charter fair to the streets of Sherborne, where by tradition hurdy-gurdy music plays all day and the fair is proclaimed from the town hall steps, a noisy autumn custom that has been held in this abbey town since the thirteenth century."
Sherborne Pack Monday Fair
"Six million snowdrops in over 40 varieties carpet the Victorian Fernery, Lime Avenue, and Lady's Walk of this National Trust estate, with volunteer-led early morning walks before the gates open to the public."
Kingston Lacy Snowdrop Season
"Mapperton Gardens throws open its doors each February for a series of Snowdrop Sundays, when drifts of galanthus carpet the Arboretum and Avenue of this historic West Dorset estate, offering one of the first and most atmospheric garden openings of the year."
Mapperton Snowdrop Sundays
"Britain's first snowdrop town hosts nine days of guided snowdrop walks, open gardens, plant sales and a twilight lantern parade led by the mythical Galanthus Dragon through the streets of this ancient hilltop town."
Shaftesbury Snowdrop Festival
"One of England's oldest surviving fishing-village customs, children carry flower-covered garlands through Abbotsbury on Old May Day (13 May) to collect for charity, continuing a tradition first recorded in 1867."
Abbotsbury Garland Day
"A fortnight-long festival rooted in Purbeck since 2001, combining open studios across the Isle of Purbeck with world-class concerts, exhibitions at Rollington Barn and the National Trust's Corfe Castle visitor centre, and a dedicated young artists programme."
Purbeck Art Weeks Festival
"Bells, clogs and fiddles bring this historic market town alive as dance teams parade through the streets in a kaleidoscope of movement and sound."
Wimborne Minster Folk Festival
"A weekend celebration of local food producers, street food, live music and art on the Dorset coast at Highcliffe, where artisan stalls, live cooking demonstrations and family entertainment fill the clifftop town each June."
Highcliffe Food and Arts Festival
"The UK's largest palaeontology festival spreads talks, palaeoart workshops and hands-on science across a Jurassic Coast town where Mary Anning once hunted fossils."
Lyme Regis Fossil Festival
"A compact and charming vintage tractor and stationary engine rally right at the harbour mouth in West Bay, where Jurassic Coast cliffs frame rows of gleaming machinery from another century."
West Bay Vintage Rally
"Contestants eat as many two-foot lengths of raw stinging nettle as they can in one hour at the Bottle Inn in Marshwood, while a separate competition crowns the grower of the longest nettle within ten miles of the pub."
World Stinging Nettle Eating Championship
✦ Weird & Wonderful"Road and rail come together at Swanage Railway in a three-day celebration of transport history, with full-size steam engines on the field, heritage trains still running, and a rare chance to ride a brake van down a track not normally open to passengers."
Roads to Rail Steam Rally
"A relaxed South Dorset family show at Moor Farm that has grown from small roots into one of Weymouth's premier events, with steam engines, classic cars, birds of prey and an arena programme all within sight of the Jurassic Coast hills."
Chickerell Steam and Vintage Show