Grand Parade, plays and a Victorian fete at the 2025 Dickens Festival

A grand parade, The Mystery of Edwin Drood on the stage and a beach party are just some of the events taking place for the annual Dickens Festival from June 13-15.

The festival, which is marking its 88th year, will also include talks, a Victorian Summer fair and music and more.

The event celebrates the town’s link to the Victorian author who first visited in 1837 when he was 25.

After lodging at 12, High Street, where he worked on ‘Pickwick’, he took a house, which is now part of The Royal Albion Hotel, where he finished ‘Nicholas Nickleby’.

He also stayed at Lawn House, which is now Archway House, where he wrote part of Barnaby Rudge and finally at Fort House where he spent the majority of his holidays in Broadstairs and wrote part of ‘American Notes’, ‘David Copperfield’ and ‘The Haunted Man’.

It was at Fort House, now Bleak House, on his last long holiday in Broadstairs that he wrote ‘Our English Watering Place’ published in August 1852 and standing as a permanent reminder of his affection for the town.

In 1937, to commemorate the centenary of the author’s first visit, Gladys Waterer, the then resident of Dickens House, conceived the idea of putting on a production of David Copperfield and of having people about the town in Victorian dress to publicise it and the festival was born.

The Broadstairs Dickens Fellowship was formed the same year and today members meet in Broadstairs on the first Wednesday of each month.

Festival play

The Mystery of Edwin Drood

The unfinished novel by Charles Dickens, dramatised by John Goodrum at the Sarah Thorne Theatre in Broadstairs, June 13-15

Friday at 7.30pm, Saturday at 3pm & 7.30pm, Sunday at 7.30pm

The festival play is one of the highlights of the Dickens Festival, where visitors to Broadstairs are likely to cross paths with the likes of creepy Uriah Heep and the grimly fading bride Miss Havisham… vivid costumes and colourful eccentric characters plunge the town into a Victorian timewarp for the annual festival.

Tickets £14.50 in advance, £16.50 on the door Plus £1 booking fee Book now

Parade

The parade takes place at 10am on Saturday 14 June, from Pierremont Gardens, making its way to the bandstand.

Bleak House

Bleak House Broadstairs, formerly known as Fort House, was the favourite holiday home of Charles Dickens and where he planned and wrote parts of David Copperfield, Bleak House and Our English Watering Place.

The site will have an open gardens event on June 14-15 from 10am to 5pm.

They will host Ramsgate Croquet Club, Northdown Brewery, Margate Flowers, Chicken Interiors, Margate Mushrooms, RoRo’s ice cream, Wilson’s Provisions and offer rides on a miniature railway.

They will also be joined by Kebbells restaurant with a seafood stall plus Pimm’s and Chapel Down sparkling wine.

Festival Timetable 2025