Hedgerow Fest 2026: Artists in Hedges

What to Expect

Hedgerow Fest 2026 is a boutique two-day festival built around Ireland’s hedgerow ecosystem, run at Mount Briscoe Organic Farm outside Daingean to coincide with National Hedgerow Week. The programme brings together artists, poets, authors, foragers, farmers, ecologists and craftspeople rather than a single kind of act, so a weekend visitor moves between visual art, spoken word, live music and prose readings across the farm’s outdoor spaces. English hedgerow writer Richard Negus, author of Words from the Hedge, gives readings on both days, and the farm runs hands-on masterclasses in hedgelaying, the traditional countryside craft of weaving and staking a live hedge into a stock-proof barrier. Organisers frame the weekend around “creativity, nature, hedgerows and slowing down”, and much of the programming ties back to the environmental case for hedgerow maintenance, including its role in carbon storage, biodiversity corridors and flood control on midlands farmland. The setting itself is a working organic farm rather than a purpose-built festival site, so the weekend doubles as a chance to see Mount Briscoe’s own hedges and growing methods at close range between the scheduled talks and performances, rather than at a marquee dropped into a field for the occasion.

Good to Know

• Dates: Saturday 5 and Sunday 6 September 2026, running across both days
• Time: various, with the two Richard Negus readings and the hedgelaying masterclasses spread across the weekend; check the booking page for the running order
• Venue: Mount Briscoe Organic Farm, Daingean, Co. Offaly, R35 N729
• Price: not published on the booking page at time of writing; book through tickets.mountbriscoe.ie
• Organised by Mount Briscoe Organic Farm in partnership with Daingean Development Association
• Contact: 087 250 7827 or mountbriscoe@gmail.com
• Recurrence: this is the festival’s inaugural year in 2026, timed to National Hedgerow Week

Getting There

Mount Briscoe Organic Farm is outside Daingean in east Offaly, roughly 15 minutes’ drive from Tullamore and under an hour from Dublin via the N4 and R400. There is no rail service into Daingean itself; the nearest stations are Tullamore and Portarlington, both served onward by Bus Éireann.

While You’re in Daingean

Daingean sits on the Grand Canal, close to the site of the former Daingean Reformatory, and is a stop on the canal greenway walking and cycling route. There is more to see across Co. Offaly.