Wonderland

As part of the Wise Words Festival I took a little trip down the rabbit hole and into Wonderland. 

The City Gardens had been transformed into a celebration of the iconic children's story, complete with roses, strange creatures and a tea party hosted by the March Hare who told stories, jokes and strange facts to the children whilst pouring pink tea and offering cakes.

Children and adults alike could explore and interact with characters bought to life right from the storybook.

  

Poems and phrases from the stories hung from the trees like strange fruits whilst the Caterpillar, Borogrove and other animals were scattered around for children to find.

Giant roses half-painted red stood tall in the garden with smaller versions available for children to paint and put on the hedges, occasionally interrupted by the Queen of Hearts whose convincing performance of 'Off With Their Heads' did make one small child sob into her tea cup.

The Cheshire Cat also made an appearance, his smile appearing high on a lamp post whilst he lay
hidden in the rose bushes nearby.

Alice herself came and talked to the children, passing off foolish ideas as facts and getting very muddled whilst the children screamed with laughter and shouted that Big Ben was not the highest mountain in the world or that 2 + 3 did not make 14563.5 and a third.

Right in the centre of the garden lay the Imaginarium, the entrance to an interactive world of games and riddles. You entered the tent in ones and two's and were seated at your first game, handed a paid of headphones and instructed to watch the screen.

But that is a story for another day...