Families

Make & Take Crafting

Saturday Morning Session

Saturday 1 June 2024, 10am–11.30am –  Make & Take Hub

An opportunity to get crafting! Activities differ every day, including everything from print-making to junk modelling with recycled materials. Get messy and creative: your imagination is the limit.

Book for the session and you can drop in at any point during the 1.5 hour duration. Accompanying adults: please stay in attendance at all times, but you do not require a ticket.

Pizza-making Workshop

Kitchen Garden Pizza

Saturday 1 June 2024, 11am –  Family Garden

Come to the Family Garden for a pizza masterclass with Kitchen Garden Pizza. In this one-hour session your imagination and creativity will be fed along with your belly! You’ll get your hands messy with freshly grown and foraged ingredients, make and top your own dough and observe the pizzaioli at work at the wood-fired oven. And while you wait for your pizza to cook, you can decorate your own pizza box!
Dairy-free and gluten-free options available.

Dr Amir Khan

Little Experts: How Families Are Made

Saturday 1 June 2024, 11.30am –  Wye Stage

Find out how families begin and how you become a part of your family, with award-winning GP and presenter Dr Amir Khan (Good Morning Britain, You Are What You Eat). Dr Khan brings his incredible knowledge, and passion for sharing it, to the question of where babies come from and what happens to them next.

Sponsored by the National Adoption Service for Wales

Richard Wiseman

Magic Your Mind Happy

Saturday 1 June 2024, 11.30am –  Spring Stage

Delve into the secret world of wizardry with psychologist and Member of the Inner Magic Circle Professor Richard Wiseman. He reveals how learning magic tricks can boost your confidence, social skills, creativity, happiness and much, much more. Experience the world’s greatest optical illusions, have fun discovering how to perform magic, uncover the secret science of sorcery, and find out how to transform a tea towel into a chicken!

I Love Books Illustration Workshop

With Mariajo Ilustrajo

Saturday 1 June 2024, 11.30am –  Creative Hub

Find out how to make a picture book with award-winning author/illustrator Mariajo Ilustrajo. You’ll have the chance to create one of your own with Mariajo in this interactive workshop featuring her newest picture book I Love Books. Discover how she goes about creating them, learn how to draw the characters from I Love Books and decide for yourself the order the pages will go in. What colours will you choose for your drawings?

Please bring your own sketchbook and pencils to draw along in this event.

Make & Take Crafting

Saturday Lunchtime Session

Saturday 1 June 2024, 12pm–1.30pm –  Make & Take Hub

An opportunity to get crafting! Activities differ every day, including everything from print-making to junk modelling with recycled materials. Get messy and creative: your imagination is the limit.

Book for the session and you can drop in at any point during the 1.5 hour duration. Accompanying adults: please stay in attendance at all times, but you do not require a ticket.

Ben Garrod

A Dog in Africa

Saturday 1 June 2024, 1pm –  Spring Stage

Meet Jack-Jack, the world’s coolest dog, who looks after orphaned chimpanzees in Africa; he’s about to embark on his biggest adventure ever. “I spend my days playing with baby chimps. When I meet Ben, suddenly, I have more baths than ever (previously none). I wave goodbye to my pet fleas, and prepare to fly thousands of miles. I’ve never been on a lead or in a car, so what will an aeroplane be like?”

Ruchira Gupta

I Kick and I Fly

Saturday 1 June 2024, 1pm –  Writers at Work Hub – Hwb Awduron wrth eu Gwaith

Ruchira Gupta tells the courageous story of a young girl in India who faces being sold into the sex trade by her father to repay his loans. After a chance meeting with a kung fu instructor, 14-year-old Heera realises there is another way – using her body to protect herself and those she loves. So when her best friend from school goes missing, Heera embarks on a daring rescue mission that will take her all the way to New York.

Gupta is founder-president of Apne Aap Women Worldwide, an anti-sex trafficking organisation that has helped thousands of girls and women in India leave a life of forced prostitution. She is a social justice activist, feminist campaigner, Emmy Award-winning documentarian and professor at New York University who has dedicated her life to creating a world where no child is bought or sold. I Kick and I Fly is her debut novel.

I Love Books Illustration Workshop

With Mariajo Ilustrajo

Saturday 1 June 2024, 1pm –  Creative Hub

Find out how to make a picture book with award-winning author/illustrator Mariajo Ilustrajo. You’ll have the chance to create one of your own with Mariajo in this interactive workshop featuring her newest picture book I Love Books. Discover how she goes about creating them, learn how to draw the characters from I Love Books and decide for yourself the order the pages will go in. What colours will you choose for your drawings?

Please bring your own sketchbook and pencils to draw along in this event.

Adam Kay & Henry Paker

Kay’s Incredible Inventions

Saturday 1 June 2024, 2.30pm –  Wye Stage

Do you ever wonder where the stuff around you all came from? No, not from the shops. I mean, who had the amazing idea of making video games or the annoying idea of building a school? In this laugh-out-loud event with the record-breaking and extremely handsome Adam Kay and Henry Paker, you’ll learn about everything ever invented, from the daft to the disgusting to the downright dangerous. You’ll discover the queen who pooed on the first ever toilet, how velcro was invented by a dog and why the Ancient Greeks wiped their bums on dinner plates, as well as 48,762,851,208 other facts. (Approximately.)

Gita Ralleigh

The Destiny of Minou Moonshine

Saturday 1 June 2024, 2.30pm –  Spring Stage

Worldbuilding is the key to captivating stories in films, television and gaming as well as books. You’ll have fun working together in this interactive session to help you create your own unique world. Gita Ralleigh is the author of The Destiny of Minou Moonshine and The Voyage of Sam Singh, both magical adventures set in a parallel colonial India.

Creative Writing Workshop

With Emma Carroll

Saturday 1 June 2024, 2.30pm –  Creative Hub

Do you ever get stuck for a story idea, or when you’ve started writing quickly run out of steam? Author Emma Carroll (The Somerset Tsunami, The Week at World’s End) shares tips on how to fire your imagination in this fun, interactive workshop, searching out potential ideas and inspirations to encourage you to keep writing. You’ll consider how the unique experience of being you can be useful when writing, as well as trying out some short exercises to warm up your creativity so you’re ready to put pen to paper.

Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England

Make & Take Crafting

Saturday Afternoon Session

Saturday 1 June 2024, 2.30pm–4pm –  Make & Take Hub

An opportunity to get crafting! Activities differ every day, including everything from print-making to junk modelling with recycled materials. Get messy and creative: your imagination is the limit.

Book for the session and you can drop in at any point during the 1.5 hour duration. Accompanying adults: please stay in attendance at all times, but you do not require a ticket.

Pizza-making Workshop

Kitchen Garden Pizza

Saturday 1 June 2024, 3pm –  Family Garden

Come to the Family Garden for a pizza masterclass with Kitchen Garden Pizza. In this one-hour session your imagination and creativity will be fed along with your belly! You’ll get your hands messy with freshly grown and foraged ingredients, make and top your own dough and observe the pizzaioli at work at the wood-fired oven. And while you wait for your pizza to cook, you can decorate your own pizza box!
Dairy-free and gluten-free options available.

Dermot O’Leary

Wings of Glory

Saturday 1 June 2024, 4pm –  Wye Stage

Dermot O’Leary, the popular presenter and author of the Toto the Ninja Cat series, swoops into Hay Festival to tell us all about his brand new action-adventure story with a feathery twist. Wings of Glory is a wartime tale guaranteed to make you laugh and cry – featuring courageous loop-the-loops, top secret plans and more than a smattering of bird poo!

Krystal Sutherland

The Invocations

Saturday 1 June 2024, 4pm –  Spring Stage

Unlock the mystic art of curse writing in this hands-on ‘invocations’ workshop, where you’ll craft personalised spells with Krystal Sutherland, inspired by the witchy world of The Invocations. Join the bestselling author for an enchanting session of creativity and magic, and leave with your own bespoke curse. No humans are harmed in the making of this curse!

Please bring your own notebook and pen or pencil to this event.

Creative Writing Workshop

With Emma Carroll

Saturday 1 June 2024, 4pm –  Creative Hub

Do you ever get stuck for a story idea, or when you’ve started writing quickly run out of steam? Author Emma Carroll (The Somerset Tsunami, The Week at World’s End) shares tips on how to fire your imagination in this fun, interactive workshop, searching out potential ideas and inspirations to encourage you to keep writing. You’ll consider how the unique experience of being you can be useful when writing, as well as trying out some short exercises to warm up your creativity so you’re ready to put pen to paper.

Pizza-making Workshop

Kitchen Garden Pizza

Saturday 1 June 2024, 4pm –  Family Garden

Come to the Family Garden for a pizza masterclass with Kitchen Garden Pizza. In this one-hour session your imagination and creativity will be fed along with your belly! You’ll get your hands messy with freshly grown and foraged ingredients, make and top your own dough and observe the pizzaioli at work at the wood-fired oven. And while you wait for your pizza to cook, you can decorate your own pizza box!
Dairy-free and gluten-free options available.

Rob Biddulph

Peanut Jones

Sunday 2 June 2024, 10am –  Wye Stage

Illustrator Rob Biddulph sketches out a fun-packed and interactive session for all the family. Rob’s brilliant #DrawWithRob videos have inspired many to take up a pencil, and now you can join in live with a draw-along fresh from his latest book. The final book in his Peanut Jones trilogy, Peanut Jones and the End of the Rainbow, dazzles with magic, danger, friendship and art. Find out all about Rob’s journey from budding artist to award-winning picture book creator and Guinness World Record holder in this event fizzing with fun and creativity.

Steve Antony

Cat Nap & Rainbowsaurus

Sunday 2 June 2024, 10am –  Spring Stage

Join bestselling and award winning author and illustrator Steve Antony in a high energy, interactive, story time and drawing event. Meet Steve's mischievous character, Cat, and hunt down a vibrant dinosaur in his brand new picture books Rainbowsaurus and Cat Nap. These perfect family reads introduce naptime, colours and animals to little ones.

Nathanael Lessore

Steady for This

Sunday 2 June 2024, 10am –  Creative Hub

Join Nathanael Lessore for an interactive, laugh-out-loud workshop-style event. Nathanael’s breakout debut Steady for This introduces us to wannabe rapper MC Growls. When a livestream practice goes horribly wrong Growls has to prove his talents, not just to the school but to himself. The King of Nothing is Nathanael’s latest book, which celebrates boyhood and is inspired by his own experience of the joys and challenges of growing up as a working-class person of colour.

Pizza-making Workshop

Kitchen Garden Pizza

Sunday 2 June 2024, 10am –  Family Garden

Come to the Family Garden for a pizza masterclass with Kitchen Garden Pizza. In this one-hour session your imagination and creativity will be fed along with your belly! You’ll get your hands messy with freshly grown and foraged ingredients, make and top your own dough and observe the pizzaioli at work at the wood-fired oven. And while you wait for your pizza to cook, you can decorate your own pizza box!
Dairy-free and gluten-free options available.

Make & Take Crafting

Sunday Morning Session

Sunday 2 June 2024, 10am–11.30am –  Make & Take Hub

An opportunity to get crafting! Activities differ every day, including everything from print-making to junk modelling with recycled materials. Get messy and creative: your imagination is the limit.

Book for the session and you can drop in at any point during the 1.5 hour duration. Accompanying adults: please stay in attendance at all times, but you do not require a ticket.

Pizza-making Workshop

Kitchen Garden Pizza

Sunday 2 June 2024, 11am –  Family Garden

Come to the Family Garden for a pizza masterclass with Kitchen Garden Pizza. In this one-hour session your imagination and creativity will be fed along with your belly! You’ll get your hands messy with freshly grown and foraged ingredients, make and top your own dough and observe the pizzaioli at work at the wood-fired oven. And while you wait for your pizza to cook, you can decorate your own pizza box!
Dairy-free and gluten-free options available.

Frank Cottrell-Boyce

The Wonder Brothers

Sunday 2 June 2024, 11.30am –  Spring Stage

Learn about the biggest vanishing trick of all time with multi-award-winning author Frank Cottrell-Boyce. In Frank’s adventure mystery, The Wonder Brothers, Blackpool Tower has disappeared. Can two young magicians do the impossible and bring back the tower? Find out about magic, hear readings and get writing tips from the master of storytelling in this fun-filled event.

Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England

Sarah Coyle

Pick a Story

Sunday 2 June 2024, 11.30am –  Creative Hub

Join Sarah Coyle for a highly interactive event, specially created for Hay Festival, where you’ll embark on two adventures and decide what happens every step of the way. First, you’ll work together to find out why Tylwyth Teg the fairy is cross and causing all sorts of mischief at the Festival. Then you’ll help Zara, the star of Sarah’s latest book (Pick a Story: A Monster Princess Shark Adventure), to find her beloved Old Ted. But was he taken by a monster, pinched by a princess or snapped by a shark? You decide!

Make & Take Crafting

Sunday Lunchtime Session

Sunday 2 June 2024, 12pm–1.30pm –  Make & Take Hub

An opportunity to get crafting! Activities differ every day, including everything from print-making to junk modelling with recycled materials. Get messy and creative: your imagination is the limit.

Book for the session and you can drop in at any point during the 1.5 hour duration. Accompanying adults: please stay in attendance at all times, but you do not require a ticket.

Owen Sheers

Drew, Moo and Bunny, Too

Sunday 2 June 2024, 1pm –  Writers at Work Hub – Hwb Awduron wrth eu Gwaith

Join Welsh poet Owen Sheers (The Green Hollow) to hear the lyrical story of a little boy and his two best friends. As they fly around the world on a magic rug, they find trouble on the dark sea. Can they find what they need to return home?

In association with The Drew Barker- Wright Charity

Pizza-making Workshop

Kitchen Garden Pizza

Sunday 2 June 2024, 3pm –  Family Garden

Come to the Family Garden for a pizza masterclass with Kitchen Garden Pizza. In this one-hour session your imagination and creativity will be fed along with your belly! You’ll get your hands messy with freshly grown and foraged ingredients, make and top your own dough and observe the pizzaioli at work at the wood-fired oven. And while you wait for your pizza to cook, you can decorate your own pizza box!
Dairy-free and gluten-free options available.

Pizza-making Workshop

Kitchen Garden Pizza

Sunday 2 June 2024, 4pm –  Family Garden

Come to the Family Garden for a pizza masterclass with Kitchen Garden Pizza. In this one-hour session your imagination and creativity will be fed along with your belly! You’ll get your hands messy with freshly grown and foraged ingredients, make and top your own dough and observe the pizzaioli at work at the wood-fired oven. And while you wait for your pizza to cook, you can decorate your own pizza box!
Dairy-free and gluten-free options available.