Looking out to the horizon from Marine Studios we can see a storm coming, and we need something to look forward to. So we’re creating Back & Fill, a one-off festival for interesting times, inspired by the currents of seaside life. Celebrating Margate’s resilience, it’s programmed to happen at the end of what looks like being a tough summer season. By creating a network that supports artists and makers, independent shops, small arts venues and seaside tourism businesses, it’ll practically demonstrate the power of arts led regeneration.

We’ve called it Back & Fill because that’s a sailing term, for using the advantage of the tide being with you when the wind is not. That seemed to be about right, for where we are now.

Back & Fill is being created with an open source toolkit, which we’ll make available to any seaside town wanting to create their own festival. We’ll provide a framework, tools to engage audiences, logos and branding, and deliver some online training films based on our combined fifty years of programming seaside festivals in Margate and Worthing (between us, we have made things like GEEK, Worthing Art Trail and Open Houses, and Pushing Print).

Back & Fill will happen in the autumn school holiday, between 23rd October and 1st November 2020 (if we’re still in crisis, the backup date is February 2021).

Want to know more? Drop us an email wave@marinestudios.co.uk, and tell us what you have programmed or planned for that week, or what you’re postponing now and might want to reschedule. Or tell us what you’d like to make just for Back & Fill.

We’re talking to funders, but we have no confirmed funding yet, so if you want to put some money in our fighting fund that’d be great.

We’ll be in touch soon with more news! Look forward to hearing from you.

All the best