Friday 13 and Saturday 14 October 2023

Join us for a two-day harvest festival themed around using jars to store food and more. Students, staff and the local community are all welcome to come and enjoy the edible campus and celebrate the harvest season.

All events are free and no booking is required*, simply turn up on the day. Children under the age of 16 should be accompanied by an adult.

Information about the locations of the events and accessibility is provided at the bottom of this page. Please be aware that events and locations may need to be changed at short notice dependent on the weather conditions. We will update people on the day as best we can.

* except for A Jar of Memory Pickles (see details below)

Friday 13 October

15:00-18:00 Apple pressing with Transition Loughborough press. Update 11/10/23 – the apple pressing has been postponed due to the weather forecast. We are still expecting to run this on Saturday 14 October from 11am.

Location: Prairie Garden

15:00-17:00 A Jar of Memory Pickles with artist Janhavi Sharma. Discover how hand-made food inspires Janhavi’s work when viewed as an archival material. She will share anecdotal histories derived from personal experience and reflect on food-making practises like pickling and preserving. We will examine how these practices hold spaces for storymaking and storytelling.

Join us in the simple act of sharing stories while we create our own personal ‘Memory Pickles’, thinking about the tastes and stories we want to pickle.

We encourage all participants to bring with them a clean empty glass jar with a lid.

Places at this event are limited so please register your interest in advance by emailing Environment@lboro.ac.uk.

Location: International House

17:00-18:00 Fruit Routes Twilight Walk with Mita Solanky. A processional walk around Fruit Routes with lantern jars. Hot drinks will be served from 18:00-18:30. Update 13/10/23 – this event will still go ahead as planned as there are parts of the walk that are sheltered.

Location: Barefoot Orchard

18:30-19:30 Night Jar Ensemble.

IMPORTANT NOTE – due to the weather conditions, the Night Jar Ensemble on Friday has been cancelled. It will take place on Saturday as planned.

Saturday 14 October

11:00-16:00 Apple pressing with Transition Loughborough press. Help press juice or bring your own apples and containers to make fresh juice or cider.

Location: Prairie Garden

11:00-14:00 Harvest Produce Swap. Bring your home or locally-grown fruit and veg to swap, raw or transformed into something delicious in a jar. Recipe ideas also welcome.

Location: LAGS Garden

11:00-13:00 Summer in a Jar with Landscaping and Gardening Society (LAGS) members. Make your own dried herbs, foraged jams and jellies.

We encourage all participants to bring with them a clean empty glass jar with a lid.

Location: LAGS Garden

11:00-13:00 Jam Jar Lantern making with Mita Solanky (drop-in activity). Create your own oil-lamp vigil in a jam jar, decorated using foraged autumn leaves, berries and seeds. This is a self-led activity inspired by the artist’s childhood memories of an oil-lamp that would burn throughout the day outside their pantry of rice, grains and preserved foods. This vigil was an offering of gratitude for the bounty and abundance that the natural world provides but also a marker of using this abundance with care. The slow burn symbolises how our consumption should also burn slowly. Why not bring your jam jar lantern along to the Twilight Walk.

We encourage all participants to bring with them a clean empty glass jar with a lid.

Location: Walled Garden

11:00-14:00 Bake-Off entries. Enter our annual bake-off by making something savoury or sweet (including preserves) with locally-grown produce. Prizes for children and adults. Free to enter. We are delighted to welcome Charnwood Eco Hub as guest judges.

Bake-Off entries must be received by 2pm. You must include a full list of ingredients and allergens with your entry. If you do not include this then your entry may not be able to be judged and it can’t be shared with the rest of the bakes at the prizegiving tea at 3pm.

Location: LAGS Garden

13:00-14:00 Jarvest Bells with Mita Solanky (drop-in activity). Create your own ankle bells for dancing, which can be used at our workshop with Bare Bones Border Morris Dancers later in the afternoon. This activity is inspired by the folk traditions of agrarian societies that held some form of community dancing at harvest time. Mita grew up in the UK celebrating a form of Gujerati folk dance known as Garba, which is very similar to the English Morris Dancing traditions. The bells can be seen as symbolising the seed heads and signifying hope, making a joyful sound before entering winter.

Location: Walled Garden

15:00 Jarvest Bake-Off winners announced. Tea and bakes served until 16:00.

Location: LAGS Garden

16:00-17:30 Bare Bones Border Morris Dancers performance, workshop and public dance session. Enjoy a live dance performance and learn a few Morris dance moves. No experience needed. After a short break, we will all join in a dance together and you can wear your Jarvest dancing bells and make some joyous noise.

Location: Walled Garden

17:00-18:00 Fruit Routes Twilight Walk with Mita Solanky. A processional walk around Fruit Routes with lantern jars. Hot drinks will be served from 18:00-18:30.

Location: Barefoot Orchard

18:30-19:30 Night Jar Ensemble. Gather with us among the fruit trees to enjoy a performance by students from LSU Classical. Hot drinks will be served from 18:00-18:30. Chairs and blankets will be provided.

Location: Barefoot Orchard

Locations on campus

Barefoot Orchard – nr Pilkington Library, opposite University Lodge

International House – on University Road, opposite the Paddock Pitch-up

LAGS Garden – at the back of car park 5

Walled Garden – next to Bridgeman Building on Margaret Keay Road

Prairie Garden – behind the Garden of Remembrance

Accessibility

Events in Barefoot Orchard take place on level ground with some on site seating provided. The Twilight Walk is not always on structured paths but is mostly flat with alternative routes for sloping areas.

The path between the Walled Garden and Prairie Garden includes steps but an alternative route will be available.