Sundial Festival 2026: Our Biggest Celebration Yet
On Sunday 5 July, more than 1,300 guests, friends, partners and exhibitors came together for our annual Sundial Festival. Returning to our 2025 venue, we were treated to glorious sunshine throughout the event—and during the days of preparation beforehand!
Sundial Festival continues to grow in both scale and attendance, and this may have been our best year yet. There aren’t many places where you’ll see a dance-off between a robot and a lion, but Sundial Festival is where enterprise, resilience and opportunity come together.
The festival is an opportunity to celebrate the incredible work of our partner organisations, showcase their projects and help them build new connections. We were delighted to welcome several of our long-standing partners, including PEAS, Habitat for Humanity, Challengers and Frensham Pond Sailability, alongside many others.
Pathways Community Trust also joined us where Pathways Together was on hand to offer information and support to parents and carers, while Future Pathways shared more about its Alternative Provision. The Cookie Bar Bus also proved extremely popular, welcoming a constant stream of visitors in search of iced coffee and cookies! It was also wonderful to welcome two Leo Lion companies, OnePlanet and Neurable.
There was plenty to keep families entertained throughout the day. Inflatable obstacle courses, rock climbing, sports challenges, go-karts and traditional fairground games provided excitement for all ages. Visitors could meet the Lunar Eclipse Therapy Horses and Wild Science’s reptiles, enjoy music and movement with Suzie Sings & Signs, have their faces painted, capture memories in the photobooth and explore stalls hosted by our partner organisations.
For anyone needing some time away from the crowds, the Quiet Zone offered arts and crafts, sensory play and garden games, as well as individual sensory tents that families could borrow for a calming break.
The excitement stepped up another level when the performers took to the stage. Across two 45-minute performance blocks, Undershaw students entertained the crowd with a brilliant combination of group and solo performances. We were also thrilled to welcome our first performer from Pathways Education—a wonderful milestone that we hope will be followed by many more.
With live footage shown on a big screen beside the stage and additional speakers positioned around the site, the performances created a true festival atmosphere. Stepping onto a stage takes tremendous confidence, and every young person who performed should be incredibly proud. Their achievements are also a credit to the staff and families who support them, as well as the warm and encouraging Sundial audience, which continues to give young people such positive opportunities to grow in confidence.
Keep an eye out for the release of the performance album, which will be available to download. Our photographer also captured some fantastic moments from throughout the day, which you can find on our Facebook page [here]. If you visited the photobooth, you can view those photographs in the album [here].
A huge thank you to everyone who helped make Sundial Festival 2026 such a success. We’re already looking forward to next year!
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