It’s time to start planning the summer jollies and if you’re a community festival and street art junkie like me, the citywide arts festival, Le Voyage a Nantes, which runs from 1st July – 27th August may be right up your street.
Set on the Loire River in one of France’s most dynamic and creative cities, this festival celebrates a plethora of artists, designers, gardeners, cooks, DJs and graffiti artists, all invited to express their creativity in public spaces creating art trails, market gardens, street art and sculpture.
We love the fact that the city becomes everyone’s garden, a multi-disciplinary playground of discovery, and a place to meet and share new experiences. A pop-up open-air canteen with its own vegetable garden will make an appearance, along with local restaurants, celebrating the best the region has to offer in food and the famous Muscadet vino.
Visitors can explore the city’s former shipyards, closed in 1987, which have undergone an architectural renaissance, with new roads, buildings and developments all springing up in what was formerly derelict land, utilising and transforming the abandoned industrial buildings and disused warehouses there. Justly, Nantes has now gained a reputation for being one of France’s most dynamic and creative cities with Le Voyage à Nantes as the jewel in its crown.
Artistic Director Jean Blaise has been instrumental in transforming the city from one in decline to a cultural powerhouse with both permanent and temporary artistic attractions created by French and international artists – he says:
“The idea of the festival is to colonise every part of town with artistic creation.”
Le Voyage à Nantes has created a unique approach to art that demonstrates its value every day. This will be the sixth annual festival in the city, which represents the culmination of a sustained cultural regeneration programme that begun in the early 1990s. Le Voyage à Nantes engages all its cultural institutions, local businesses, universities, museums, and all aspects of the city.
The programme for 2017 will be announced shortly. For updates and further details, and details of previous editions, see the website http://www.levoyageanantes.fr/en/.
Flights:
Travel from UK to Nantes with Air France. At time of post prices started from £123.
Some ideas for places to stay:
‘Unique place to stay Nante’ – Travelling Book Junkie
Over and out #SELB
