Wednesday 9 April 2014

The Bowler Hat: a new venue for City of London Festival

The Bowler Hat: a new venue for City of London Festival
22nd June – 17th July 2014
#colfbowler   www.colf.org

City of London Festival’s Bowler Hat Theatre – artist’s impression

The City of London Festival is creating an inflatable pop-up venue in the shape of a giant bowler hat near St Paul’s Cathedral, that should see the area become a hub of festival activity. Standing at over 10 metres high – the equivalent of 3 storeys – the bespoke Bowler Hat will play host to over 100 events, including children’s theatre, cabaret, comedy and circus. The structure will seat 212 people, allowing audiences to enjoy renowned performers in an intimate space. 
The Bowler Hat will host a busy and eclectic programme, with the likes of world-class puppeteers Little Angel Theatre during the day, commuter-hour debates on City-related themes of Justice, Money and Power, and evening shows featuring stand-up satirists Richard Herring and Andy Saltzman, award-winning acrobatic circus artists Pirates of the Carabina, and Judy & Liza, a musical homage to the legendary stars of stage and screen, Judy Garland and bowler hat-wearing Liza Minnelli.
The design is modelled on the original bowler hat, created in 1849 by the world’s oldest hat shop, Lock & Co, to protect a gamekeeper’s head from overhanging branches. An icon long associated with the City of London, the unmistakable hat became an essential part of every City worker’s uniform – by the 1950s, businessmen wouldn’t be seen in the Square Mile without one.  With its added showbiz connotations, thanks to Kubrick’s Clockwork Orange, James Bond villain Oddjob and celebrities such as Keira Knightley, the Bowler Hat is an ideal motif for the Festival.
The Bowler Hat venue is backed by the City of London Corporation as part of its role to support culture in and for the City. From its site in Paternoster Square the dome of the hat will echo Britain’s most famous dome, St Paul’s, where the City of London Festival has staged impressive orchestral concerts since it began in 1962.
Paul Gudgin, in his first year as Director of the City of London Festival, said: “The City of London is an exceptional place for a festival – full of extraordinary spaces, buildings and people.  By taking a City icon and transforming it in this way we believe the Bowler Hat will prove to be a striking, popular and fun addition to London’s cultural scene this summer”.
John Scott, Chairman of the Culture, Heritage & Libraries Committee of the Corporation of London, said: “Cultural life in the City is changing, engaging with more visitors in new and exciting ways, and finding new relationships with City workers themselves. The Bowler Hat will let everyone know it’s Festival time! It is destined to make a big difference to summer in the City.”
Fiona Woolf, Lord Mayor of London, said: “I am delighted to see one of the City’s historic, and most iconic, symbols – the bowler hat – revived for the City of London Festival.  We have no doubt that new audiences will be bowled over by the Bowler Hat venue – which is bringing a smile to us all!”

Box office: 0845 120 7502
Twitter: @ColFestival
The full Bowler Hat line-up will be available on www.colf.org from early April. 
Tickets for events in the Bowler Hat and the full Festival programme will go on general sale on Tuesday 15 April