BLOOM FESTIVAL - A Free Mental Wellness Festival
- BLOOM FESTIVAL 2022 Sunday 8th May | 10am - 8pm
- A Free Mental Wellness Festival for Mental Health Awareness Week
Bloom is back for 2022, and for the first time - in person! The nation’s mental health has no doubt deteriorated over the last two years, making it even more important to us and our communities that Bloom returns this Spring.
Bloom Mental Wellness Festival was born out of our want to connect, create, and celebrate our community in a mindful and safe space. Bloom is here to platform and broaden our understanding of experiences of mental health and wellness in our city and beyond, to explore and celebrate the arts as a tool of expression and healing, and to bring our community together in a celebration of self and creativity.
From dance and arts workshops, to community and creativity panel discussions, mindfulness and music classes, film screenings, live performances, open mic, a giant community mural to leave your mark on - and special guest and mascot of Devon Recovery Learning Community - Patrick the Shetland Pony.
Exeter Phoenix have reached out to the local community to bring a wealth of arts organisations, support groups, charities and mental health and wellbeing practitioners together under one roof for the festival; Bloom will be taking over the whole of Exeter Phoenix for the day!
There will also be opportunities to take part outside of the day itself. Look out for our community poetry competition, launching Tues 19th April and satellite events around the main festival also reflecting on mental health, in recognition of mental health awareness week, which the festival date intentionally falls at the start of.
Some organisations will be offering workshops or talks, sharing with the community a taster of what they do, such as Pelican Project whose members will be running sensory workshops, or Magic Carpet who will be running mindful felt making with one of their artists. Everyone is welcome to join in!
Other organisations, such as The Samaritans, and TALKWORKS will be there to offer the community access to mental health support - both on the day, but also as a resource for the ‘mental health toolkit’ participants might be building for the future.
This event has been made possible thanks to the kind sponsorship of Iron Mill College and The Exeter.
Isobel Langton, Chief Executive of The Exeter, said:
“At The Exeter, we’re committed to supporting mental health and wellbeing and are proud to have introduced fully trained Mental Health First Aiders for our own employees. We’re delighted to have been given the opportunity to support this year’s Bloom Festival, which is providing members of our local community the chance to come together and share the importance of mental wellness and what it means to them.”
Iron Mill College will be chairing panel discussions including ‘The Power of Connection – Community and Collaboration in Mental Wellness’, where contributions from a wide range of perspectives will be explored, and the thoughts and experiences of attendees are very welcome. They will also be on hand to talk about training options for those who are considering or already work in mental health.
Principal Dr Jo Trelfa said:
“Iron Mill College, Exeter, is delighted to be sponsoring such a fantastic event that will raise the awareness of mental health and wellbeing in our city. With our 40-year history of delivering activities and workshops on mental health, our low-cost counselling service, and training courses to professionally qualify counsellors and psychotherapist, it is a focus of great significance and concern to us. We support the Bloom Festival wholeheartedly and are looking forward to seeing everyone there. Do come and say hello!”
We want to offer the chance for everyone to find their place in the festival, whether that be getting stuck into the activities, or reflecting in a quiet space, and we have considered this in our broad programme.
The majority of festival activity has both drop-in and pre-booking options and is free or Pay What You Decide to attend.
Everyone is welcome to join us on Sunday 8th May from 10am until early evening, where the festival will conclude with an Open Mic in association with Spork! Poetry.
Join us - for the chance to discuss, collaborate, create, advocate, and celebrate together in a recognition of the importance of mental wellness.
PROGRAMME OF EVENTS
Our most up to date programme of events and booking are available on our website : https://exeterphoenix.org.uk/genre/bloom-festival/
CONTRIBUTORS AND FACILITATORS
(Subject to change)
| Alright Mate? (Cally Hayes & Stephen Raff) | Beyond Face | Big Emotions (Laura Loft) | Chaya Collective |
| CoLab | Devon Recovery Learning Community | Double Elephant Print Studio | Eating Disorders Devon |
| Emma Welton (Sound artist) | Good Gym | Iron Mill College | Juanita Dellaway, Hypnotherapist |
| Magic Carpet | moMENtum | Pelican Project | Poetry Archive |
| Phonic FM | Recovery Devon | Samaritans, Exeter | Scotty Gillespie, Artist |
| Spork! Poetry | Sound Gallery | TALKWORKS | The Bridge Collective |
| The Exeter | Vanessa Miles, Photographer | Zebra Collective | Wellcome Collection |
Bloom Festival Programme Information: https://exeterphoenix.org.uk/genre/bloom-festival/
