What a brilliant start to 2026 we have had! Including Collective Wisdom Founder, Truda Spruyt’s inspirational visit to the Jaipur Literature Festival, where she interviewed Oliver Møystad, Senior adviser at NORLA, about Norwegian children’s literature at Jaipur Bookmark, the festival’s home for international publishing conversations. We’re looking forward to book festivals closer to home, including Stratford-upon-Avon, Cambridge and Appledore, and working with some brilliant authors, but this month has also been full of theatre, visual art and dazzling museum objects. The team is also getting stuck into a range of strategic projects including with The Royal School of Needlework, Norwich Theatre and Big Creative Education in Walthamstow.
In February we had the world premiere of our client Philip de Voni’s first stage play The Ophiolite at Theatro Technis. Set in both Cyprus and England, the play explores themes of belonging, family and duty, using both English and Cypriot Greek language. We secured listings in theatre outlets including British Theatre Guide, Theatre Flyer and West End Wilma, as well as in Love London Love Culture and Camden New Journal. The press night attracted 10 reviewers including The Guardian and Camden New Journal and was described as ‘Smart and hugely entertaining’ (North West End) and ‘A compelling… thought provoking and carefully layered evening’ (Plays to See).
We’ve been working with Philip since late last year on building his own channels, including a new website and Substack.
The end of January also saw the announcement that Theatro Technis are to undergo a significant capital project, enabling the independent theatre to be more resilient, enabling creativity, artistic influence and community impact, situating them as the new Cypriot National Theatre in London. Doubling auditorium capacity and creating new performance spaces, the project places strong emphasis on social inclusion, accessibility and wellbeing, prioritising sustainability throughout decision-making and operation. The announcement saw coverage from Theatre-News and The Stage.
The Cromwell Museum have secured a rare 17th-century pocket watch believed to have belonged to Oliver Cromwell. Cromwell is believed to have gifted the watch to his officer John Blackwell in 1650, and it remained in the family until 2019. After being briefly displayed in 2024, a major public appeal and generous grants from The National Lottery Heritage Fund and Art Fund saw the museum permanently secure the watch where it is now on display on-site in Huntingdon. Coverage has included articles in Museums + Heritage, The Hunts Post, BBC News Cambridgeshire, and The I Paper.
Our client Croydon Council is the first London location to host The National Gallery: Art On Your Doorstep, a major free outdoor exhibition programme that will bring life-sized reproductions from the gallery to 12 locations across the UK. Selected with the help of local community groups, 30 paintings are on display across the borough from 3 February to 5 July 2026. We secured widespread coverage across multiple outlets, including Time Out London, Secret London, Londonist, In Your Area, Sutton and Croydon Guardian, MyLondon and an interview with Culture Croydon Programme Lead, Caterina Loriggio, on BBC Radio London.
Mallika Kapur’s new podcast The Next Edition launched in February. Hosted by the award-winning journalist and author, Kapur uses her global perspective shaped by living and working in the world’s major cities to break open stories we think we already know, revealing a powerful truth that the most compelling chapter might not be the one we know, but the one that’s yet to be told. The inaugural episode features guest Yann Martel, author of Booker-Prize winning novel Life of Pi, with others including award-winning journalist Barkha Dutt, novelist and storyteller Elif Shafak, and Pulitzer-winning photojournalist Lynsey Addario. The Next Edition releases episodes weekly on all podcast platforms including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music and more.
Cambridge Literary Festival’s Spring Festival will run from 22 – 26 April 2026. There has been much excitement in the media for the announcement of the line-up, which includes Dame Mary Berry and faithful crime writer Harriet Tyce with over 100 pieces of coverage across the nationals and key regional outlets including The Independent, Mail Online, London Standard and Yahoo! as well as print pieces in iNews, The Scotsman, The Herald and The Yorkshire Post. The coverage also highlighted the specially commissioned lectures from Deborah Levy, Caroline Lucas and Rachel Clarke, as well as a range of events Going All In with the celebrations for the National Year of Reading.
Following last autumn’s record-breaking success, Stratford Literary Festival will return this May, with the full line-up to be announced next week. The festival, running from 7 – 10 May, will once again bring together leading thinkers, writers, broadcasters and performers, with first confirmed headline names including, BBC broadcaster Sophie Raworth, psychotherapist and bestselling author Phillipa Perry, wildlife photographer Gordon Buchanan, psychologist, BBC Life Changing presenter Dr Sian Williams, and Children’s Laureate Frank Cottrell-Boyce. Alongside the spring festival, SLF Patron Maggie O’Farrell will also share her latest novel Land at a sold-out event in June, plus a special off-festival event on 6 March with celebrated writer Robert Macfarlane.
