Sharrow Festival will return to Mount Pleasant Park on Saturday 4 July, bringing one of Sheffield’s best loved community events back after last year’s festival was cancelled due to lack of funds.

First launched in 1997, Sharrow Festival is a FREE one-day multicultural festival that brings together music, dance, food, workshops, children’s activities, community groups and local people from across the city. The festival usually welcomes around 4,000 people across the day and this year will run from 12noon to 8pm.

This year’s festival will be bigger than ever, with four stages across the site and a programme that reflects the energy, creativity and diversity of Sharrow and the wider city.

A new addition for 2026 is the Youth Music Stage, programmed by Heeley based Hybrid 3 Studio, creating a platform for young artists and emerging talent. The all weather pitch will host the Sheffield Graffiti Jam, with recognised spray can artists from across the country working live throughout the day. Sheffield DJs will bring the music, with sounds from Maypleef and JuJu Master from Calabash!, Donpapa and Magzy from Native Sonics, and DJ Dylor, all powered by Demus sound system.

The Music Stage, hosted by MC Jonny Douglas and headlined by Malachite, will showcase six of Sheffield’s finest bands. The Community Stage will welcome back the irrepressible MC Nige, alongside Cowbird, the latest musical project from Captain Jack Avery, live Nigerian music from Café Sound, belly dancers and more.

For the first time, the festival will also present Dynamic Dance youth dancers, led by dance leader and youth worker Chekere Williams.

Alan Deadman, one of the festival’s volunteers, said: “It’s been an uphill struggle to bring the festival back. We’ve been organising fundraising events through the year to get the funds together, but we all feel that it is so important to bring people from all ethnic backgrounds together to enjoy themselves, particularly now when there are people out there trying to sow division and hatred.”

Sharrow Festival has always been shaped by the people who make the area what it is. After a year away, its return is a reminder of what can happen when a community decides that a space for joy, culture and togetherness is worth fighting for.

The festival is free to attend and open to all.