Planning ahead for a fantastic St Patrick’s Day festival
The first St Patrick’s Festival was held over one day and night in 1996 and took just five months to prepare.
Now a four-day celebration in the capital, planning takes 18 months so preparations for next year started almost six months ago.
Ireland’s biggest annual celebration has become extremely lucrative too, and is expected to generate over €120m for the economy this year.
This year’s festival takes place from March 14 to 17 and will feature world-class events, street theatre and artistic installations.
Minister of State Michael Ring said the festival acted as the cornerstone of Ireland’s tourism calendar.
Mr Ring said the festival continued to evolve in response to the tastes and demands of visitors and had reinforced Ireland’s reputation as the destination of choice internationally.
“It is due in no small part, to events such as St Patrick’s Festival, that we have seen visitor numbers to Ireland increase every year for the past four years.”
The festival is funded by Fáilte Ireland and Dublin City Council, with the organisers tasked with portraying the country internationally as a creative, professional and sophistic country with wide appeal.
The theme for this year’s parade is ‘Celebrate Now’ and leading street theatre and pageant companies will respond with their fantastic creations and thrilling performances.
Marching bands from the US, Mexico, Germany and Ireland will entertain the crowds with uplifting scores and powerful rhythms.
Last year’s festival parade theme ‘Let’s Make History’ was the first of a series of three. Next year it will ‘The Future’ — who we aspire to be in the next 100 years.
About half a million people are expected to attend the parade, that will be led by Brendan O’Carroll of Mrs Brown’s Boys fame.
The entertainer said he was both surprised and delighted to be, as he put it, “walking for Ireland”.
The festival’s cultural programme will have artists from a variety of disciplines performing in some of the city’s historical and culturally significant locations.
All ages are welcome to join the festival’s free treasure hunt on Saturday morning, March 14, which will take participants through a collection of the city’s landmark buildings and venues.
The festival and RTÉ Radio 1 will present Céilí House Live, an evening of traditional music, song and dance in the National Hall, on Saturday night.
The Big Day Out, a day-long street carnival, takes place on Sunday, March 15, at Merrion Square, and on Monday, traditional Irish dance will be celebrated at St Stephen’s Green.
www.stpatricksfestival.ie
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