Presented by multi-award winning local distillery Lanty Slee at the flagship venue The Stickle Barn, The Lake District gets ready to host its first annual Octoberfest.
Featuring over 50 artists and DJs alongside more than 50 different beers and ales on draught and much more.
Taking place in The Langdale Valley, the picturesque UNESCO World Heritage Site will host a special four-day event with music spread over several stages.
Headliners include Radio 1’s Charlie Tee, Reggae legends Dub Pistols and Barrow’s very own export AIM. Manchester’s 10-piece Riot Jazz brass band will also bring the good times alongside folk favorites Face The West. Joined by the finest in the region including 8-piece Ska-Reggae outfit Bad Transmission from Ulverston. 6-piece funk band Steel Foxes and local star Evie Plumb (of Lowes) and Meetwood Flac will also be performing over the weekend.
The event will act as a platform for some of the Lake District and surrounding areas’ best up and coming talent such as Shark Le Funk spinning a full vinyl set and a full folk acoustic stage in association with Lanty Slee hosting acoustic favorites like Undercover Hippy alongside local talents including Native Cult and Jon Dawes.
As beer fans would expect from Octoberfest, the drink and food offering will cover all bases for enthusiasts.
Breweries including Bowness Bay, Coniston, Fell Brewery, Tirril The Lakeland Brewery, Langdale Brewing Co, Keswick and Cumbrian Legendary Ales, Gan Yam Brewery, Old School Brewery and Crooked River will be lined up presenting guest ales meaning that there really will be something for every beer-drinker.
For those partial to something more fizzy, spirits and cocktails will be served up by co-host Lanty Slee themselves delivering their award-winning pouring range of Vodka, Gin, Rum and Whisky in the Cocktail Tipi.
Street food and concessions will come from the likes of Earthworm Kitchen providing a vegan offering and Lanty Slee’s festival menu will be serving everything from bratwurst to burgers and hog roasts to mac n cheese.
The festival will also offer a series of workshops in art, yoga, foraging, guided walks and more. For example a Sip & Paint with Millie Scribbles will enable festival goers to craft a unique souvenir inspired by the Langdale Valley. The workshops which will of course feature the Lanty Slee pouring range will be free to ticket holders.
Octoberfest Directors Joe Nichols of Langdale and Sam Dixon of Coniston said: “We feel privileged to have the opportunity to organise a celebration of this scale for Langdale and the wider Cumbrian region. We have wanted to introduce a locally focused event to bring together our rural community and worked hard to source and collaborate with the very best suppliers and creative professionals, we want this festival to be a respectful celebration of the beautiful valley it sits within!”
Set against one of the most beautiful backdrops in the country, Lanty Slee’s first ever Lake District Octoberfest promises to be a feast for the eyes, ears and taste-buds!
Tickets on sale now: https://octoberfestlangdale.com. Full weekend tickets, which allow access for four days, start at £60.50 for adults and £22 for children. Day tickets, which are nearly sold out, are priced at £22. Bell tents and campervan sites are available from £367.50 and £49.75 respectively.
For more info visit: https://octoberfestlangdale.com https://www.instagram.com/octoberfestlakes/.
The Lanty Slee distillery resides in the iconic Stickle Barn in Great Langdale. The building has been managed by the National Trust for the last 10 years but with so many other huge projects they decided to find a local operator to take over the mantle and continue their great work.
The distillery is named after Lancelot Slee, or Lanty as he was to be known. A historic figure in the region, he was described as a ‘stiff, fresh-faced man of great endurance’, famous for supplying the Lake District with illicit Liquor for over 50 years.
Born in 1802, he had an illustrious career, working as a Quarryman by day and bootlegging by night, packing his horses’ hooves with wad to silently transport his produce past the Excise men and over mountain passes.
Lanty Slee would have regularly passed The Stickle Barn on his way to Wrynose Pass which he used to travel to Ravenglass for supplies, a four day round trip by pack horse, accompanied by his faithful lurcher to alert him of any excise men laying in wait!
The distillery took over the building at the end of May and spent five weeks renovating it and getting ready for the summer. As well as distilling its own spirits, the venue offers cakes, coffee, local ales, Lanty spirit, hand crafted cocktails, nibbles, hearty meals and good times from 10am to 10pm every day. Live music is booked in for every weekend through the summer, evenings are eclectic with everything from folk to Ibiza chillout classics.