Bristol's St.Patrick's Day Parade is back for 2024 - and it's bigger than ever

Bristol's St.Patrick's Day Parade is back for 2024 - and it's bigger than ever

Posted on: 27 Feb 2024

The W.E. Irish Bristol St Patrick’s Day Parade 2024 is back and bigger than ever, along with a packed programme of events.

 

Next month is Sunday 17 March – better known as St. Patrick’s Day, the celebration of Irish culture! As always, our local Irish cultural association, West of England Irish (aka W.E. Irish, formerly Bristol Irish Society) are throwing a veritable buffet of celebrations to welcome the day in.

 

Chief among those celebrations, of course, is the annual St. Patrick’s Day Parade – a colourful celebratory march through the centre of the city that heralds the beginning of the day’s celebrations.

 

 

Last year’s parade was the biggest Bristol has ever seen, and was a runaway success, building serious momentum that W.E. Irish plan to carry on this year – making the parade even bigger than before, and heading through some of Bristol’s most iconic locales.

 

The parade will kick off from 1pm outside M Shed, heading through the city with a stopoff at Queen’s Square for a performance of Irish music and dance, finally ending up at St Nicks for the rest of the celebrations to kick off properly.

With celebrations on arrival on St Nicholas Street, the day will eventually give way to jubilant night, as the official evening afterparty begins at the Glass Arcade and Revolution Bar. As well as activities for all ages, there will be Irish dancing from four different Bristol schools, as well as Irish musicians and folk singers to keep crowds merry. There will also be two dedicated bars celebrating Ireland’s best liquid exports – Guinness and Irish Whiskey!

 

Leading up to the parade, W.E. Irish are running a diverse programme of events from the 8th of March onwards, including gigs, ceilidhs, and the extremely popular comedy night, Craic House.

Hosted at Bristol Folk House on Saturday the 10th of March, Craic House will see four Irish comics at the top of their game perform keenly-funny sets, hosted by local comic Burt Williamson, and headlined by globe-trotting, wildly successful comedian Keith Farnan.

 

For more information on the parade, or on the programme of events celebrating St.Patrick’s Day, head to the W.E. Irish website, or follow them on social media.

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Patrick Bate

Patrick is a filmmaker with so much Bristol in his blood the white blood cells are graffiti'd. Educated at the Northern Film School in Leeds, he’s returned home to be a Videographer and Reviewer for 365Bristol and BARBI. When he’s not messing about with cameras, he enjoys playing guitar, spending far too much time on tabletop RPGs, and being an awful snob about cider. Have a look at his work here, or get in touch at patrickb@365bristol.com.