A free, late-night culture crawl is making its return to Newcastle and Gateshead this month.
Museums, galleries, studio collectives and historical buildings will leave their doors open late for The Late Shows, which offers visitors a once a year chance to become involved in after-hours events including hands-on workshops, behind the scenes tours, performances and parties.
The Late Shows first started back in 2007 and has grown in popularity ever since. The event began with 14 venues taking part but that number has risen to over 70, with around 40,000 visitors making their way to The Late Shows across the weekend. The event was set up to encourage people to visit cultural venues that they may not have known about, as well as sharing audiences between the different venues.
This year, there are two days of late-night culture crawling. On Friday, the event will be situated at venues centred in the Ouseburn Valley whereas Saturday will be at venues sprawled across Newcastle and Gateshead, with both taking place after 19:00. For children, there is a Twi-Lates event between 16:00-19:00 and for adults, there is also a prolonged session called The Late Late Shows which brings together a selection of venues that are usually open past 23:00, meaning you can end the evening much later if you so wish to.
The Late Shows takes place on Friday 17th and Saturday 18th May. Admission is entirely free. For more information about the event, please head to thelateshows.org.uk where you can find out more about the list of workshops and performances taking place.
