Meet our 2026 festival sponsors
Thanks to the Mid Suffolk District Council Rural Support Fund for their generous grant to support the 2026 Foreword Festival.
Thank you to Bruce and Ollie at The Handyman in Eye for their sponsorship and support.
Thank you to Hartismere School for their generous sponsorship of the Children’s and YA Book Fair, and for providing festival parking for our staff, authors, and volunteers.
Thank you to Cem and the team at Caféye for their donation of the use of the café for our Poetry Open Mic Night.
Developed in partnership with Eye Town Council and Mid Suffolk District Council, the Eye Love project brings together heritage, independent businesses, events and everyday life in Eye under one shared identity. Eye Love invites residents and visitors alike to explore, support and take pride in this distinctive Suffolk town, and is a key supporter of this year’s festival.
QuirkHouse Theatre Company was founded in 2014 by a forever-questioning writer-musician and an ever-intrigued actor-poet, to show new writing and talent in creative ways and bring theatre to people and places that might not normally see it.
Taller Books publishes innovative UKYA novels, and provides an editing service tailored to the needs of indie authors. Their YA book review blog features more than 150 Young Adult books, demonstrating their passion for YA literature. Sign up to their newsletter and download a free novella!
Thank you to the National Year of Reading 2026 campaign for their support for the festival.
Thank you to our amazing venues: Eye Town Hall (and Eye Town Council), Eye Library, The Queen’s Head, Caféye, The Hexagon, The Bank Arts Centre, and Eye Community Centre for working with us to make this festival happen.
Thank you to NHS Property Services and Hartismere Hospital for providing free parking for our festival visitors, Cocoa Mama for donating some amazing sweet treats for some of our guest authors, Eye Magazine for their kind promotion of our events, Eye WI for providing unmissable cakes for our family party, The East of England Co-op for the voucher, Liz Packer for taking good care of our poetry guests, and of course, all our wonderful volunteers. We couldn’t do this without you!
Sponsors and supporters of past events
Thank you to Softwood Books for their kind sponsorship of the Foreword Festival UK 2025. Softwood Books offers bespoke editing, design, marketing, and printing services, putting you in control of your publishing journey.
Thanks to the Councillors of Mid Suffolk District Council for their generous Locality Award grant, supporting the 2025 Foreword Festival.
Thank you to Gudgeons Prentice Solicitors in Stowmarket for their kind support for this year’s festival.
Thank you to the Friends of Stowmarket Library for their generous donation in support of the Foreword Festival UK 2025.
We are thrilled to be working with the Regal cinema in Stowmarket to bring you our Books at the Movies author talks and panels on Sunday 10th August.
We would like to thank the amazing team at Suffolk Libraries, and particularly Stowmarket Library, for working with us, promoting the festival, and providing a free venue for many of our author talks and children’s events.
We are excited to be working with the Fox Yard Studio to bring you a display of art inspired by writing, books, and typewriters, throughout the festival.
Thank you to the Food Museum, the John Peel Centre, the 1936 Café Bar at the Regal Cinema, and The Royal Oak, for providing us with fantastic free venues for our pop-up storytelling for grown-ups!
Thank you to Stowmarket Town Council for supporting our plans, inviting us to take part in the August Family Friendly Market and the Stowmarket Food and Drink Festival, and helping to promote the festival.
We are very grateful to Gipping Press for sponsoring our printed publicity materials.
We’re working with Roughacre Brewery to create something very special for the festival – watch this space!
Thanks to Keep Governance and Safeguarding for working with us to produce an effective safeguarding policy for our events.
Huge thanks to Woodcutter Manero for granting us a commercial licence to use his fantastic font, Hardcore Attitude, for our publicity materials.
The Foreword Festival 2023 was held in The Guildhall, Bury St Edmunds. The stories of 1000 years of Bury St Edmunds heritage are woven into the very fabric of the Guildhall – the oldest continuously used civic building in Britain. Monks, monarchs, merchants and miscreants have all played their part in this fascinating tapestry of time. We are excited to join them!
The organisers of the Foreword Festival 2023 would like to thank the Bury Literature Festival for supporting and promoting our event.
Thank you to Combat 2 Coffee Bury St Edmunds for providing our pop-up café at the Guildhall in 2023, and keeping our authors and guests fed and caffeinated.
Thank you to John Woodward Photography for spending an afternoon taking photos and geeking out with authors from Bury St Edmunds, and for providing fantastic head shots and festival photos for Jackie and Rachel.
Insurance Provider
Insurance for the Foreword Festival UK C.I.C. is provided by PolicyBee.
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