Limetree Festival
26 – 28 August 2010
Lime Tree Farm, Grewelthorpe, North Yorkshire
Yorkshire’s funkiest family friendly
festival, Limetree in Grewelthorpe, in partnership with the not for profit organisation
tapwater.org, take event sustainability to new heights. Limetree
Festival will be the first of its kind anywhere in the world to be
plastic free and have a working zero landfill policy.
Although Lime Tree is small in festival terms it would still be expected that up to 20,000 single use plastic bottles would be used during the three day event. Glastonbury, the largest event in the UK, used 20 articulated lorries full of plastic bottled water for the 2010 festival or 1,000,000 single use bottles.
tapwater.org will be organising drinking water from the
festival’s own supply during the event for both visitors and artists, there will be no
plastic bottled water on site.
Sean Birdsall, founder of the Limetree
festival commented: “We are so pleased to be working towards a more sustainable
festival with
tapwater.org. As we are blessed with having our own water on site we have always encouraged our
festival family to drink it which has the knock on effect of encouraging less rubbish and
plastic waste. It is a challenge to minimise the use of disposable bottles and plates but with the help of
tapwater.org we are moving towards a
plastic free festival.”
At tapwater.org’s marquee festival-goers will be able to help themselves to still drinking water in glass jugs and garnished with lemon, lime or mint, all for free. There will also be economical stylish re-usable bottles available to purchase should they forget their own. The tapwater.org marquee is strategically placed in the centre of the festival and not hidden away in a corner of the site, showing a real commitment by the organisers to make sustainability work in a festival environment while also easing the burden on festival-goers’ pockets.
Says Michael Green, Director of
Tapwater.org, ”The aim of the Limetree
Festival is to be zero landfill and
plastic free, which fits perfectly with
tapwater.org’s ethos. The invitation to provide water for the
festival is a fantastic opportunity for us to promote the virtues of tap water and our scheme to an informed audience.”
Embracing music and culture with a great line up on five individual stages, each with their own agenda, the festival is diverse but all inclusive. The main Green Man stage hosts some of the bigger names including, and making their Limetree debuts, ethnic eletronica from Transglobal Underground; The Fantastics who have performed live on BBC sessions for Mark Lamarr and Craig Charles; Mercury and Brit award nominee jazz singer Carleen Anderson and merging the sounds of jazz, blues, folk, funk and pop Krystle Warren.
It’s not all about the music at Limetree, although it plays a very major part: the festival takes places at Lime Tree Farm, a spiritual sanctuary at the edge of the Vale of York, complete with roundhouse and stone circle. For the first time this year there will a science area themed on the planets offering eight practical demonstrations and workshops for families during the day, and the chance to remember what the night sky looks like away from the glare of city lights with after dark telescope sessions accompanied by music.
Limetree is a family run festival and it has always been important to organisers Sean and Karen Birdsall, and their family, that children have as much to do and enjoy as the adults. The children’s area includes harp and guitar workshops, DJ taster sessions and for the littlest ones, ‘Weenyboppers’ with songs and games. A separate camping area this year allows families to relax when it comes to bedtime knowing they won’t be woken by late night stragglers and there is a growing programme of events and workshops for toddlers and teenagers.
Limetree Festival 2011 is supported by Welcome to Yorkshire and Lodge Environmental Solutions Ltd.
Ends
Editor’s notes
Lime Tree Farm
Hutts Lane
Grewelthorpe
North Yorkshire
HG4 3DA
· Adult Weekend (18+) Advance: £85, on the gate: £95
· Junior Weekend (5 – 17) Advance: £25, on the gate: £35
· Under 5′s: Free
· Family (2 adults & 2 junior) £210
· Campervan: £35
· Day Tickets (adult): £35
· Day Tickets (child): £15
2. Limetree Festival is run by the Birdsall family; Sean, his wife Karen and their children Kaseana (20) and Keenan (17) and the theme of family as a close group or people, physically related or not, artists playing or ticket holders attending, is fundamental at Limetree.
The festival, which includes a health and well being area, is based at the historic location of a Roman encampment at Camp Hill, so offers clear views across the Vale of York, moorland and rivers Ure and Swale.
Lodge Environmental will ensure that all food waste is composted on site, the festival uses reusable polycarbonate cups at the bar and everything else is sorted before being sent for recycling. The Sorted Dance Tent is fully solar powered
3. The people behind Limetree Festival are:
· Karen Birdsall
· Sean Birdsall
· Cleve “Rev Chunky” Freckleton
· Sarah Freckleton
· Natalia Gerodetti
· Matthew Lindberg
· Lisa McLennan
· Sue Mills
· Garry Scoulding
4. The Haggis Horns saxophonist and husband to Corrine Bailey Rae, Jason Rae was part of the Leeds music scene before his premature death in 2008. As a tribute to their friend and colleague, Limetree founders Sean and Karen Birdsall named a stage after Jason and use this as a platform for the very best in regional and national talent.
5. Welcome to Yorkshire
• Welcome to Yorkshire is the official tourism agency for Yorkshire, working to grow the county’s visitor economy.
• Welcome to Yorkshire is funded by Yorkshire Forward, the Regional Development Agency charged with improving the Yorkshire and Humber economy.
Key facts include:
• Tourism in Yorkshire is worth £7 billion annually
• The region’s industry employs a quarter of a million people
• There are 216 million visits to Yorkshire each year
6. Lodge Environmental Solutions Ltd. are the experts in floor-to-ceiling domestic, commercial and public sector cleaning and specialise in using the latest eco-friendly practices and bio-degradable products. With over 25 years’ experience and a 60 strong BICSc qualified team, they offer a responsive 24/7 service to homes, offices, warehouses, hospitals, schools and industrial sites.
This includes extreme and gross filth clean-ups, flood and fire restorations, industrial cleaning, office cleaning and house cleaning, and encompasses everything from 1,000 acres sites to a single room. Full details of their ‘keep clean, go green’ approach can be found at:
7. Tapwater.org is a not for profit organisation whose aim is to reduce
plastic bottle waste in landfills by changing our attitudes to tap water. They have launched a scheme to make tap water more accessible on the high street. A tap water map highlights participating cafés, pubs and shops enabling people to locate
free tap water refills using their mobile phone or the Internet. Although relatively new, the scheme is picking up pace and there are already over 700 tap water refilling stations.
In addition to the scheme, tapwater.org have designed a high quality, stylish, stainless steel re-useable bottle. The lifebottle has a unique and innovative cap and a twin wall vacuum construction, which keeps water cold for up to 20 hours.
All profits from the sales of the bottles will be used to; raise awareness of the damaging effects of bottled waters on our environment; expand our network of refilling stations; and provide mains fed water machines for educational establishments.
www.tapwater.org
Suzanne Noble
