Idler

Fenton House is hosting the second Idler Festival in July 2019.

Featuring Dr John Cooper Clarke, Sally Phillips and many more to be announced.

Last year’s line-up featured Michael Palin, Carole Cadwalladr, John Lloyd and David Graeber, and this year’s will be just as starry and lively. We transformed Fenton House into a fantastical school for the weekend, with events taking place in most of the rooms inside as well as out on the lawn and in the orchard. Click above to watch a short film from last year’s festival.

Michael Palin said, ‘The Idler Festival at Fenton House is an Arcadian idyll. A beautiful house and garden embraces a whole host of activities. The ideas and talks are all the better for being aired in the open, and the home-made sausage rolls are the best this side of heaven. Immensely civilised…a balmy, magical atmosphere.’

Festivalgoers gather on Fenton’s lawn for Michael Palin’s talk

Fenton is a Queen Anne merchant’s house in the heart of Hampstead village. Its elegant reception rooms and bedrooms will set the scene for Idler Academy tutors to host salons where you can drop in and ask questions over a cocktail.

Busy doing nothing: lounging in Fenton’s beautiful orchard

There will also be wandering minstrels, dancing lessons, local walks, beekeeping, gardening, calligraphy, ukulele and harmonica lessons, plus the Idler Good Stuff market featuring independent British makers.

Lady Binning’s bedroom, photo by National Trust

Location: Fenton House is a brick mansion with a walled garden built for a wealthy merchant in the 17th century. It houses the Benton Fletcher collection of harpsichords, 17th-century needlework, a ceramics collection featuring Chinese and 18th-century pieces, formal lawns, a sunken rose garden, yew hedges, a 300-year-old orchard and a working kitchen garden. It was given to the National Trust by the last owner Lady Binning in 1952.

Times:

Friday 12th: 6pm-9pm

Saturday 13th: 11am-7pm

Sunday 14th: 11am-7pm

Tickets

Early Bird Weekend Tickets – SOLD OUT

Tier Two Weekend Tickets – £90 (saving £15)

Discounted tickets are very limited and when they’re gone, they’re gone!

Click ‘buy now’ at the top of this page to reserve yours.

Day tickets available soon.