Artwave Festival
For 16 September days, hundreds of artists and makers open studios, homes and galleries across the Lewes District villages from Lewes to Seaford, Newhaven and the surrounding countryside in its 32nd year as the South East's most accessible open art festival.
A genuinely characterful historic market town stacked with independent shops, artisan bakeries, a Friday food market, CAMRA-listed pubs serving Harvey's ales, and a striking position within the South Downs National Park, Lewes earns its reputation as one of the most rewarding small towns in the South East.
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"One of the earliest events of the Sussex bonfire season sends costumed societies and burning torches through a pretty Wealden village high street."
Mayfield Bonfire
✦ Weird and Wonderful"Thirty specialist nurseries gather at Christopher Lloyd's legendary experimental garden for a weekend of rare plants, short plantsmanship talks at the stalls and famous cake."
Great Dixter Autumn Plant Fair
"This small Wealden village keeps the old Sussex tradition alive with a torchlit procession, costumed marchers and a village bonfire and fireworks."
Northiam Bonfire
✦ Weird and Wonderful"Six rival bonfire societies stage torch-lit processions, burning effigies, and fireworks through the streets of Lewes on the 5th in what is widely regarded as the UK's most spectacular and defiant Bonfire Night tradition."
Lewes Bonfire Celebrations
"Six rival bonfire societies fill the narrow streets with blazing torches, burning crosses and exploding effigies in the wildest Fifth of November spectacle in the world."
Lewes Bonfire Night Celebrations
✦ Weird and Wonderful"Visiting societies and burning torches process past the abbey where the Battle of Hastings was fought, ending with a roaring bonfire and fireworks."
Battle Bonfire
✦ Weird and Wonderful"Sixteen days of classical music, jazz and spoken word in the churches, halls and historic spaces of a handsome Sussex market town. Sheku Kanneh-Mason among the 2026 headliners."
Petworth Summer Festival
"Ten August days and over 200 events transform this castle town into a celebration of music, drama, street art and bathtub racing, with Shakespeare performed in the Arundel Castle gardens each evening as the sun goes down."
Arundel Festival
"Ten days of author talks, debates and performances filling the regatta town of Henley-on-Thames each October, one of England's most distinguished literary festivals in one of its most beautiful river settings."
Henley Literary Festival
"Two weeks of classical concerts, theatre, circus, talks and family events filling Canterbury Cathedral and historic venues across this ancient city, one of England's longest-running arts festivals and the cultural heartbeat of Kent each autumn."
Canterbury Festival
"Britain's oldest and largest open studios festival, Oxfordshire Artweeks unlocks over a thousand artists' homes, rural studios, Cotswold village halls, and historic gardens across the county for three free weeks each May."
Oxfordshire Artweeks
"For 16 June days, 152 artists across Surrey open their studios, gardens, barns and homes as galleries, with self-guided village art trails including the Hindhead Art Trail guiding visitors through the county's creative heartland."
Surrey Artists Open Studios