Nairn Book and Arts Festival

Twenty-three years in, the Nairn Book and Arts Festival still runs at the scale of the town that hosts it. The 2026 programme opens on 29 August and closes on 6 September, most of it inside the Nairn Community and Arts Centre, the library, Seaman's Hall and the Wasps Links studios. Douglas Stuart talks about John of John. Sarah Hall brings Helm. Elsewhere there are puppet-making and weaving workshops, a walking tour of the High Street and Fishertown with Ronald Skeldon, a visit to the Black Isle Bronze foundry, and a Northern Soul night that runs to midnight. The festival has its own fringe as well.