Nelson City Council

Founders hosts two 'signature' events each year: the Book Fair and MarchFest. For one-off events, check out the Events calendar (right-most column on these pages).

MarchFest Ltd.

Saturday 24 March, 2012

$25 per adult

Set in the beautiful, traffic-free environment of Nelson's Founders Heritage Park, MarchFest is Nelson's hip harvest hop festival celebrating craft beers, regional wines, slow food and eclectic music.

MarchFest is booking quality local, national and international acts – no bland and lifeless covers bands for this event.

It is geared towards people who make informed choices about their food, drink, musical taste and want to attend a family-friendly event, which is safe, fun and a bit different to the run-of-the-mill festival. An event for people who want to savour, not just consume!

Contact MarchFest

Mic Dover

(03) 548 3887

Email MarchFest

Go to the MarchFest website

Book Fair - starts Queen's Birthday Weekend

Bountiful book bonanza

Every year on Queen's Birthday weekend the Founders Book Fair starts with over 30 tons of books for sale at bargain prices.

Books are available in over 50 categories such as travel, gardening, lifestyle, humour, fiction, biographies, military, NZ nature and history, dictionaries, adventure, classics, hobbies and cooking.

This Fair is open for nine days. Each day different books from the store room are brought into the Fair to refresh the sale tables.

Over 2000 banana boxes are packed full of quality books which have been sorted during the year.

Donating books for the book fair year-round

We accept donations of books large or small throughout the year. Simply drop off your pre loved books into the Windmill any day of the week, 10am -4.30pm, all year.

A group of 12 dedicated volunteers spend two days a week all year categorising well over 50 tonnes of books preparing for the Book Fair. A further 20 volunteers join the team to stock up the tables and co-ordinate the sales during the nine day event held over Queen’s birthday every year.

In 2009 the famous annual book fair celebrated its 22nd year of raising much needed funds for Founders Heritage Park. Nelsonians donate books throughout the year and then arrive in the thousands over Queens Birthday Weekend and beyond to buy pre-loved books at minimal prices.

Funds raised go towards capital projects with Founders Heritage Park.