Culture Night Belfast
CLIENT - Belfast City Council
Sector Engagement and Roadmap
As part of an effort to bring Culture Night Belfast back with purpose and direction, after a few years’ break, we partnered with thrive to deliver a sector engagement and audience research project on behalf of Belfast City Council. The purpose was to understand what Culture Night means to Belfast, what went wrong, and how to get moving forward again, in the right way.
We carried out sector-wide engagement with artists, venues, producers and cultural organisations, delivered focus groups and surveys to hear directly from audiences, had conversations with those involved in past Culture Nights, as well as former and potential funders.
Culture Night is a celebration of local arts, culture and heritage. It is a free event that invites audiences to visit spaces and experience culture they may not have encountered before. Everyone we consulted with described Culture Night as diverse, inclusive and fun. This is the essence of Culture Night Belfast.
The cultural sector must be at the heart of Culture Night. Artists, venues and cultural producers feel a strong sense of ownership and want to see the event reflect their values.
We developed a roadmap for delivery, outlining both short and long-term recommendations.
Short-term recommendations (for 2025):
A smaller, venue-based event focused on the creative sector (rather than the hospitality industry).
Engaging a delivery organisation with event management experience, an in-depth knowledge of the cultural sector, existing sector relationships and the capability to lay the groundwork for 2026 and beyond.
Long-term recommendations:
Develop a strong, independent governance structure
Establish an appropriate delivery model
Secure funding
Rebuild trust and collaboration across the sector
You can read the full report here.
Delivery
Following the sector engagement and roadmap exercise we were then engaged, with our partners MayWe, to deliver Culture Night in September 2025.
We focused on the short-term recommendations to deliver Culture Night.
We held a public meeting to further engage with artists, venues, cultural producers. We provided them with an overview of the process to date, gathered additional feedback and outlined the process for how to get involved.
We co-ordinated an open submission process providing artists and venues the opportunity to submit their ideas. To further support them we held ‘surgeries’ to help applicants with their submissions and to make connections between artists and venues.
We shortlisted submissions to creatively produce the Culture Night programme ensuring a diverse range of art and cultural activity was represented.
We successfully delivered a safe, engaging and inclusive Culture Night.
Thrive undertook a post-event audience survey with 200+ positive quotes received from attendees.
“I love seeing the city show its beauty, turning every corner and seeing a new cool thing.”
“It was fabulous. So much going on. A great experience. So much enthusiasm and joy in the streets. People just buzzing to see more.”
