A Fringe, Curling and a Shed

Last Thursday saw our 13th Bradford Community SOUP event, in partnership with the Rotary Club of Bradford Bronte.

As always, the competition was fierce with three excellent pitches bidding for funds for their idea to make Bradford a bit better.

The Bradford Fringe Festival, a do-it-yourself grassroots festival of performances and fun stuff running from June to September, pitched for funds for a website, programmes, and window stickers to promote the festival.

The Friends of Cardigan House (Community Action Bradford & District), who provide opportunities and support for older people (including indoor bowls and curling), pitched for funds for ‘period’ entertainers for their wellbeing café and reminiscence afternoons.

Finally, Baildon Men’s Shed (HALE, meeting at Bracken Hall), which aims to get men together to talk, work and make friends through woodwork projects, pitched for funds for some more tools.

Once the votes were counted, the Fringe Festival took home the honours, winning half of the prize pot, with the other two pitchers sharing the remaining half.

The next event is on 15th August 2019.

What is Bradford Community SOUP?

The aim of Bradford Community SOUP is to change local communities for the better by bringing together members of the community to pitch their ideas for improving our city – from social justice to community cohesion, from animals to art, from support groups to sport, the only criteria is that it should benefit Bradford.

An entry donation gets you soup, bread, salad and a vote. All donations are added to a central pot, three projects pitch their ideas and bid for your support, you cast your vote for the favourite project, and at the end of the night the prize pot is allocated accordingly. Each presenter has a few minutes to share their idea (without technology), followed by a few questions from the floor.

Find out more on the Bradford Community SOUP website.