Brat summer is so last year – get ready for an Outlaw Summer in 2025
The 39th Robin Hood Festival takes place at RSPB Sherwood Forest at Edwinstowe, Nottinghamshire, over five weekends in July and August.
Since the 1980s, the Festival at the Sherwood Forest National Nature Reserve has been drawing in visitors from across the globe to celebrate the legacy of the folk hero in the very place where he is reputed to have lived and fought.
It all begins this year on Friday 25th July with Films in the Forest – three days of outdoor cinema, with movies including the Hollywood blockbuster Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves and Disney’s Robin Hood, shown in Robin’s very own stomping ground.
Making their fourth appearance at the Festival, the Knights of Nottingham Medieval Jousting Display Team will again stage a spectacular two-part show each day onSaturday 2nd and Sunday 3rd August.
The team’s dazzling horsemanship and swordplay has wowed audiences each year since their Festival debut in 2022, retelling the legend in highly dramatic fashion as the outlaws come face to face with the Sheriff of Nottingham.
There will be historical re-enactment, children’s entertainment, storytelling, comedy, music, and much more Medieval mayhem besides between the Reserve’s Visitor Centre in Forest Corner and the iconic, 1.200-year-old Major Oak, one of Britain’s largest and oldest oak trees – and believed to be one of Robin’s hiding places within the forest.
The focus turns to myth and folklore for the Fantasy in the Greenwood weekend on Saturday 9th and Sunday 10th August, with Witchers, Orcs and even walking trees among the curious creatures who will descend on the ancient woodland.
Having been put together by Nottinghamshire County Council for many years, the Festival is organised these days by the current custodians of the forest, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB), the UK’s largest conservation charity.
The work of the RSPB and a range of other wildlife organisations across the Midlands will be the theme for the weekend of 16th and 17th August, before the outlaws return once more for August Bank Holiday weekend (23rd-25th August) for live combat displays as Robin, Marian and the Merry Men from the Sherwood Outlaws performance group play out their eternal feud with the Sheriff.
With the exception of cinema screenings, admission to the Festival is free, although there is an event parking charge of £15 per day (£12 for RSPB members) on 2nd-3rd August, 9th-10th August and 23rd-25th August.
Cinema tickets and further Festival information can be found at www.visitsherwood.co.uk There is also a Robin Hood Festival Facebook page to follow with regular updates.