Ironfest

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Lithgow, the birthplace of Ironfest, is a small town located in a rugged little valley on the western side of the Blue Mountains World Heritage National Park.

With a rich industrial history in mining and engineering, Lithgow has lived with a reputation of being cold and dirty.

Since the 1950’s industry has steadily declined, as has the population. In the 1950’s Lithgow District’s population peaked around 80,000. In the 1990’s it bottomed out around 18,000.

It was around this time that the local Council initiated an extensive beautification and rehabilitation program.

A main street beautification program was implemented, the street was paved and the building facades were subjected to heritage orders, government buildings painted, derelict buildings demolished, disused industrial sites made into parklands, and owners of valuable heritage buildings encouraged to restore their properties.

As a result, Lithgow was transformed. But the dirty cold reputation lived/lives on.

Enter Ironfest:

The first Ironfest was held in April 2000 and celebrated the one hundred year anniversary of the birth of steel in Australia, in Lithgow.

Ironfest is an annual, high profile, regional cultural heritage event that celebrates working and playing with metal, and combines art, history and technology.

Ironfest is, today, the biggest annual cultural event held in the Central West NSW, comprising of art exhibitions, stalls, live musical acts, street performance, historical re-enactment, educational and historical exhibits, technological displays, art making workshops and demonstrations, busking competitions, automotive exhibitions, machinery exhibitions, circus acts and competitions, video exhibitions, youth and multicultural events.

This year’s Ironfest involved over 600 participants and attracted over 7,000 visitors (an increase of 45% on 2005) from all over Australia.

Ironfest is calculated to have contributed over $400,000 to the local economy this year alone.

In the eight years since inception, over 25,000 visitors to Ironfest, have discovered a transformed quaint ex-industrial town, replete with extensive natural and built heritage attractions.

It is therefore no coincidence that in this time, Lithgow has recorded its first increase in total population since the 1940’s.

Ironfest has numerous goals:

1) To create direct employment for professional artists & arts workers, both through the providing of a venue for the sales of artwork & the creation of employment for event organizers, stage managers, technicians etc.

2) To boost tourism by attracting visitors to the Lithgow District on an annual basis, thus creating diverse economic stimulation and indirect employment eg in hospitality and services. (Ironfest aims to attract in excess of 100,000 visitors per annum by 2015.)

3) To make Lithgow a better place in which to live, as well as visit.

4) To provide cultural experiences both through the presenting of unique entertainments to a local audience, as well as involving locals in the organizing of events.

5) To create (recreate) for Lithgow a reputation as a centre for innovation by presenting to a local audience examples of innovation and generally creating an environment in which innovation is part of the main stream thinking.

Ironfest enjoys the strong support of the local cultural and business communities and has been the recipient of numerous local cultural, heritage and business awards.