WIMBORNE MINSTER FLOWER FESTIVAL

The first major Flower Festival to be held in Wimborne Minster for seven years will take place from Friday 2nd to Monday 5th September 2022. In recent times the Minster has held a major Flower Festival every five years and the one planned for this year should have been held in 2020 but was postponed due to the Coronavirus Pandemic. The event is to celebrate the Minsters 900th anniversary of the start of the Minster building as we know it today. The original foundations go back to the year AD705 and the 1300th anniversary was celebrated in 2005 when a host of events were held including a Flower Festival.

Sharon Austin from Carnival Flowers is designing the Festival and has been working hard with a small team from the Minster to ensure that the whole event will be a success. There will be a number of Tableaux and many other Floral Arrangements throughout the Minster all depicting the Festival theme which is “Trades – Past and Present”. A number of Flower Clubs from across Dorset and one from Hampshire are taking part in addition to the Minsters own and other local Arrangers.

The Festival will be open on the Friday, Saturday and Monday from 10.00am to 6.00pm and on Sunday from 2.00pm until 6.00pm. On the Sunday The Minster will be celebrating its Patronal Festival and the new Bishop of Salisbury The Right Revd Stephen Lake will Preside and Preach at the 9.30am Parish Eucharist when he will also dedicate the rebuilt Minster Organ. Entrance charge to the Festival will be £5.00. There will be no concessions but entry for children will be free. All proceeds will be for the everyday costs of running the Minster together with a donation to the Forest Holme Hospice.