Full programme for Buxton’s Heritage Open Days festival 2024

Vision Buxton is delighted to announce a full programme for this year’s Heritage Open Days (HOD) festival, which takes place between Friday 6th and Sunday 15th September 2024.

Following the success of last year’s festival, during which the town celebrated the 450th anniversary of the first visit to Buxton of Mary Queen of Scots, this year promises to be another great celebration of local history and heritage, with events on every day of the 10-day festival.

Groups taking part include High Peak Theatre Trust, Buxton Crescent Heritage Trust, Buxton's Anglican Parish, Buxton Local History Society, Trinity Church, Buxton Town Team, Buxton Museum & Art Gallery, Friends of Oignies Association and Derbyshire Wildlife Trust in partnership with Nestlé Waters UK.

The national theme of the festival this year is ‘routes, networks and connections’ with most events taking on some connection to the theme.

Venues throughout the town will be opening their doors for ‘open days’, including Buxton Opera House, Trinity Church, St John’s Church, Christ Church Burbage and the Crescent Assembly Rooms. All are in conjunction with tours, talks, exhibitions or musical recitals.

You can enjoy a guided walk around Lightwood Reservoir to learn about the conservation work being undertaken by Derbyshire Wildlife Trust for landowners, Nestlé Waters, and Buxton Local History Society, involved for the first time, host guided walks from Spring Gardens up to Fairfield Common following some of the historic routes of the town.

Local history fans will be pleased to hear that Buxton Museum & Art Gallery, with Peak Buildings on Terrace Road closed, will be hosting a pop-up exhibition in the Octagon Lounge in the Pavilion Gardens for three days during the festival, which will include an opportunity for attendees to have their say on what a future museum could look like.

Derbyshire County Council Leader and Cabinet Member for Strategic Leadership, Culture, Tourism and Climate Change Councillor Barry Lewis said: “It is great to see Buxton Museum getting out into the community to show off elements of the amazing collection we have in Buxton, and getting people’s feedback for what they’d like to see in the future. I’d like to encourage everyone to come along and enjoy our Pop-Up Museum event at the Octagon Lounge in Buxton Pavilion Gardens from 9th to 11th September.”

Six talks will be given, all on the theme of ‘routes, networks and connections’ by members of the Buxton Local History Society, Buxton Town Team and Friends of Oignies Association, including the proposed ‘Very Light Rail’ connection between Buxton railway station and the Monsal Trail, and on the future of the Devonshire Dome.

Buxton Crescent Heritage Trust will host creative heritage activities during one of their Crescent Assembly Room open days and Vision Buxton, which coordinates the programme for groups in Buxton, is hosting its own event, a networking morning for local businesses.

“With a theme of ‘routes, networks and connections’, we thought we would super-size our next members’ networking meeting, which happened to fall during the festival,” says Vision Buxton administrator, Ali Quas-Cohen

“All local businesses are invited to attend the networking morning, which will be kindly hosted by the Palace Hotel, on Thursday 12th September, 8am-10am, and co-presented with Business Peak District. For more information, please visit www.visionbuxton.co.uk/events/.”

All events in the HOD festival are free, although donations by hosts are welcome.

See the full programme at www.visitbuxton.co.uk/heritage-open-days-2024/.

A festival leaflet, designed and printed by Higher Buxton business, PrintExpress, is available from the Buxton Visitor Centre in the Pump Room, amongst other locations in the town.

Promotion of the HOD festival events in Buxton by Vision Buxton is supported by a grant from Tarmac Tunstead.