September Newsletter

As we move into September, we’re starting to reap the rewards of everything we planted over summer with you. Summer was bursting with life across our libraries, starting new experimental projects, reaching new audiences and celebrating new collaborations with artists, organisations and communities within Sefton and beyond. The seeds we planted throughout summer are now ready to be harvested as we move into a new season and we can’t wait to see what that brings.

July and August were full of Young Families activities across the libraries, working with artists and partners we've worked with before but in new ways. 

We collaborated with FACT to bring Cinema in the City to Bootle, screening a selection of family-friendly films related to this year’s Summer Reading Challenge theme: Story Garden. It was such a joy to work with FACT again and welcome new families to sign up to the library and join the Summer Reading Challenge via these gorgeous films. 

We welcomed Hurly Burly back to the library to test out their ideas for 'Afterparty', a new show developed with families in Bootle and coming back to the libraries early next year when it tours the country (watch this space).

Children explored ‘Heaven in the Ground’ with artists Ellie Towers and Sara Wolff. The soundwork by DARCH, the collective arts practice of Umulkhayr Muhamed and Radha Patel, was created for this year’s Liverpool Biennial. Responding to the piece, together we made underground creatures out of clay, wrote letters about our favourite memories to feed back into the soil, and dug around in the earth to see what was hidden underneath and what reverberant and strange echoes it made.

Artist and maker Abi Lake, who leads our children's activities for The Colour of Pomegranates, and artist and theatre-maker Emma Hirons who worked with us and Hurly Burly earlier this year in the development of 'After Party', led Creative Summer Play workshops for school starters.

Huge thank you to everybody who joined us over summer, to the artists we worked with, some for the first time, connecting different parts of the programme together and helping us to shape what will come next!

Over the next couple of months, we’ll be celebrating the abundant year we’ve had with a special Biennial listening event, a book launch and a panel discussion and launch in the library.

We’re especially excited to launch Queue Up And Dance, the book that brings together all of the interviews gathered during our year-long project about Quadrant Park, the country’s first legal, all-night rave which started in Bootle in 1990. 

You’ll get a chance to buy the book before it’s available in bookshops, containing interviews with people who went to the Quad, its resident DJs, and a foreword by lead artist Dave Evans, an introduction by Emma Warren, author of Dance Your Way Home, and an afterword by Melissa Kains. Book your place on DICE here for the launch event in Rough Trade Liverpool.

Everything that's on in September is now live on our website. Click here to find out more about what's coming up across the libraries and book your place. 

If you have any questions about the programme, would like to get involved as a volunteer, or any access needs for joining us, email hello@atthelibrary.co.uk!