THURROCK-based outdoor arts organisation Kinetika is celebrating the return of its annual walking, talking and making festival T100 in July, and this year have announced it will form part of the ambitious new Beach of Dreams project.

As reported on Thurrock Nub News earlier this year, Beach of Dreams is a 500-mile walk from Lowestoft to Tilbury during which 500 dreams will be collected and represented on 500 silk pennants.

Now in its seventh year, T100 has always had an inspiring theme for its walks and artworks. This year as a partner in Beach of Dreams, the theme is dreaming.

T100 Dreaming offers communities an invitation to come together to creatively re-imagine a better future as the country begins to emerge into a post–Covid world. Through a series of carefully curated and led walks, T100 Dreaming celebrates the sense of community spirit that the pandemic has heightened and nurtures the dream of a more cohesive, creative and sustainable future.

T100 Dreaming walks run from 26 July until 1 August. The festival as a whole launches in June, when between 10-13 June, four new walks will take place. The creation of four new walking routes for T100 Dreaming has been supported by Active Essex and Essex Cultural Diversity Project.

Walkers will have the opportunity to follow these specially devised walks which celebrate Thurrock's heritage, its diverse communities and links to the wider world. New walks in Grays, Tilbury, East Tilbury and Purfleet-on-Thames will offer a fresh perspective on these changing communities as each area begins a process of transformation as part of borough wide regeneration programme.

T100 Dreaming walk routes include Little Belhus Country Park which featured in 2020 as the site of a natural mandala; East Tilbury where walkers will be invited to explore international connections, a lasting legacy of the Bata era, Purfleet-on Thames, to meet local growers and chefs, and Grays where tasters of world foods will be on offer from the many communities that reside in the town.

Each T100 walk will accompany the Beach of Dreams walks bringing together the long-distance walkers who have travelled from Lowestoft with local people offering the opportunity for some challenging conversations about the future for local communities living along the Thames Estuary that will undergo rapid change in the next few years.

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At the closing ceremony on 1 August, a new piece of music will be premiered. Tilbury is the Place for Me is a reworking of the Trinidadian calypso London is the Place for Me, made famous by Lord Kitchener when he sang it in 1948 having landed at Tilbury in the Empire Windrush. Kinetika Bloco working with award-wining musician, poet and novelist Anthony Joseph, will perform the new song with young people from Tilbury.

Booking on T100 walks is essential. All walks are free to attend, led by an experienced walker and can be booked via Eventbrite from the T100 website. Booking for walks opens approximately six weeks before the festival commences. To find out more about T100 Dreaming and get involved, click here.