Our Festival of Ageing ran from 2nd - 15th July 2018 and was a great success.
Persona Care and Support, one of our festival project partners, has produced a short video that gives a flavour of the activities and events on that took place across Bury and Bolton. Click here to see the video. 4CT also produced a video to highlight the Festival best bits! Click here to watch online.
For a full copy of the festival programme, please click here.
Ambition for Ageing festival attracts over 8000 people across Greater Manchester.
We are delighted to announce that our Festival for Ageing - the first of its kind to take place across the city region - attracted in the region of 8000 people to over 350 events across all ten GM boroughs. Local celebrations took a variety of forms including coffee mornings, fitness sessions, digital workshops, tai chi, walking football, wellbeing drop-ins, public lectures, wall-climbing, knitting groups, local history discussions, social meet-ups, dances, art groups, swing music nights, games mornings, singing groups, book groups and even axe throwing!
Running from 2nd - 15th July 2018, the fortnight set out to bring people aged over 50 together to try something new, meet other people, make friends and have a good time.
Feedback on the festival included the following comments from participants, organisers and supporters:
Doreen Martin (right, with her friend Pat Lamb, left), from Gorton, ran an afternoon tea for fifty people as part of the festival. She said: “These events encourage people to get together and have a real community spirit. With something like an afternoon tea, it’s like sitting round a family table”.
Jackie Greenfield, from Saddleworth, whose stroke survivor choir sang at the festival finale said: “It’s an opportunity to publicise all the different things people can get involved in. Hopefully away from some of the stereotypes. I retired last year and although I am quite active and have a lot of social networks, I haven’t found it easy. Doing things and having other people around is a really good thing, even when you are quite connected.”
John Hannen, AFA's programme manager, is extremely pleased with the way the festival went and how many people embraced it, saying "It’s a real testament to the energy of older people in Greater Manchester. We’re grateful to everyone who got involved, from those who hosted events or volunteered to run groups to those who just showed up and had some fun.”
Andy Burnham, Mayor of Greater Manchester, offered enthusiastic support for the event, commenting: “I welcome any activity that will give people aged 50 and over the chance to improve their quality of life and feel part of a wider community. Back in March the World Health Organisation announced we are the UK’s first age-friendly city region. Building on this, it’s so important that we all find ways to stay healthy and active as we get older – and this event has given people the opportunity to sample some of the physical and social activities available for older people here in Greater Manchester."
It was during the course of the festival that the Mayor launched his Mayoral Communities Challenge, asking people to put forward their ideas for making Greater Manchester even more age-friendly and a really great place to grow old. The objective of the challenge is to inspire people to think about what needs to happen in order for us to live not only longer lives – but happier, healthier ones, too. To read more about the new challenge, click here.