Events

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Writers' Meet-Up Poetry Special

The poster gives basic details of the meet-up, which is in Lichfield on 18^th October 2025.
The meet-up is limited to 16 people due to size and layout of rooms in the Guildhall, and the cost is £35 for NAWG members/concessions, £40 for non-members. The Guildhall, while an historic building, has been modernised with a lift which runs close to the room we will inhabit for most of the day. The building has been home to Lichfield Fire service, the prison (cells are open to more fleeting visits from tourists now), and Lichfield council (not often, as far as I know, in the cells) in the past.

The price of the meet-up will include some poetry “taskmaster” challenges, a workshop from Leicester poet Roy Marshall and a tour of the Samuel Johnson Birthplace Museum, plus some free time for writing, completing your challenge, or paying a visit to other city centre tourist destinations. Lichfield is a small city and most of the centre is within less than 10 minutes’ walk of the Guildhall.

What we don’t include is lunch, or accommodation. As we are right in the city centre there are plenty of places to eat or to buy food to bring into the meeting room, which we feel is a more flexible and cost-effective solution than a one-snack-fits-all approach. Similarly if you require accommodation there are several hotels very close to the venue, even a Premier Inn about 2-3 minutes’ walk down the road.

The bus station is under five minutes’ walk from our venue, the station a further few minutes.

We are in the process of creating a pack for delegates, with some aid from Lichfield council, which will have maps and other useful information.

I am a great believer in writers and groups helping one another out, if other groups would like to run similar events and don’t have the experience I’d be more than happy to share my thoughts and planning documents (such as they are) in the hope that we can create more events for writers to gather, socialise and learn at in the future

Gary Carr