SHEAF POETRY FESTIVAL 1206253
Trustees: Brian Lewis, Kate Hewett, Oliver Mantell
Structure:
The charity is a CIO with a foundation model article of association. There are currently three trustees who manage the governance, finance and reporting of the charity, but we are seeking to recruit more. So far we have advertised the role on Sheaf Poetry Festival’s website and social media accounts, as well as directly communicating with other local organisations in our networks. We currently have no employed members of staff.
August 2024-July 25
Sheaf Poetry Festival is currently in a semi-dormant state due to a lack of funding. In July 2025 we held one event, which was a consultation and social event to bring poetry communities in Sheffield together and ask them what they might want from a poetry festival / events in Sheffield. This was a free event and we were able to secure a venue without charge at Off The Beaten Track in Sheffield.
We are now operating as a board of three trustees with former employee Suzannah Evans as a non-trustee volunteer. Two trustees, Shirin Teifouri and Sara-Jayne Hill, resigned in 2025 due to the dormancy of the festival.
Between December 2024 and July 2025 we had three board meetings at which the future of the festival, as well as events, funding applications and partnerships were discussed.
Our main objective at present is to start some smaller sustainable events which will enable the festival to regain a presence and resume manageable grassroots progress towards our charitable aims before attempting to make larger funding applications. We have begun to develop some new partnerships which we hope will help with this.
Financially we have spent very little, on website maintenance only, and we have not received any new funding so we have used existing balance to pay for this. We do not currently hold any debts or any reserves beyond
the current account balance. Our outgoings are minimal and reflect ongoing maintenance such as the festival website.
Accounts for Financial Year 24/25
Starting balance: £1,847.87
Payments in: None
Payments out [1]: £47.15
Closing balance: £1,800.72
[1] – Payments out details: £47.15 – web hosting to Wordpress.