First Felixstowe Loves Festival sees visitors flock to town

Running from August 15 to 17, the event featured a packed programme of performances by international and local music acts, including Grammy Award-winning headliner Jazzie B, frontman of Soul II Soul.

Crowds gathered at five locations across the town for the festival, which also featured DJ Ben Osborne, Spektrum, East Angles, Foley Street, and Sun Cutter.

Felixstowe mayor Corrine Franklin said the festival was helping to put the town “on the map”.

Mayor Corrine Franklin with DJ Ben Osborne (Image: Supplied) Hotels were reportedly fully booked with festival-goers arriving from as far afield as London, Birmingham, Glasgow and Northern Ireland.

More than 22 stallholders offered creative activities including craft cookies, original artworks, beach yoga and skateboarding lessons.

The festival also featured a wall of hearts led by arts coordinator Alice Stallard, incorporating more than 800 artworks.

Ms Stallard said she “counted 179 new hearts to add to the wall”, bringing the total to nearly 1,000.

More than 200 young people painted stones, while 98 screen-printed t-shirts and tote bags were created alongside 90 artworks from Woodbridge Festival’s Spin project.

The mayor of Felixstowe, Corrine Franklin (Image: Supplied) Mayor Corrine Franklin thanked organisers Felixstowe BID and Noise of Art for their efforts.

She said: “It’s so exciting to see what we can do in Felixstowe and how important the town and the sea front is to our community.”

The next Felixstowe Loves event will take place at Beach Side Event Space and other venues on September 6 and 7, with Aswad headlining.

Other acts include JS & The Lockerbillies, The Pangs and Bopper Ranking.