One of Leeds’ best-loved – and most colourful – events of the year is back for 2023, and it’s going to be bigger than ever before.
Holi Festival – known as the Festival of Colours – is a joyous celebration of peace, love, happiness and equality through live music and bright colours.
Leeds Holi Festival 2022 was a triumphant success and saw 1,200 Holi Lovers making it the biggest Colour Festival in Yorkshire, but this year, Holi Festival are kicking it up a notch and are bringing 2,500 people together to celebrate – making it the biggest open air colour festival in the UK.
The event commemorates forgiveness and peace and is widely celebrated in India and adopted around the world for celebration.
Beloved Holi Festival returns to Leeds in 2023 / Credit: Leeds Holi Festival
Holi Festival celebrates the welcoming of spring and is seen as a time for people, no matter what caste or ethnicity, to get together and enjoy a feeling of togetherness, community and happiness.
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This year’s celebrations in Leeds are set to involve the traditional dry powder paints, as well as the serving of street food, live DJs and performances right in the heart of the city.
Red is the sign of love, yellow is synonymous with healing properties, blue is the colour of Lord Krishna, and green symbolises new beginnings – and through the use of these vibrant colours, Leeds Holi Festival aims at bringing different cultures together with different genres of music under one roof.
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It’s set to be bigger and more colourful than ever before / Credit: Leeds Holi Festival
Eshaan Kapoor, founder of Leeds Holi Festival said: “Our purpose is to bring different cultures together, spread love, positivity through music, colours and food. It is best known around the world for the powder that friends and families throw on each other and it’s the festival of love, peace and happiness.”
Holi Festival’s main sponsor this year is Leeds-based taxi firm Amber Cars – who will be providing festival goers safe journeys to and from the event with no added surcharge.
“We are proud to sponsor such a vibrant, unique festival and be part of Leeds Holi Festival,” said Tarlochan, Regional Director at Amber Cars.
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“Amber cars will be providing safe rides to all festival goers making their journey safe and secured”.
is a joyous celebration of peace, love, happiness and equality/ Credit: Leeds Holi Festival
British-Pakistani singer-songwriter, Zack Knight, will be headlining the event and providing the ultimate party tracks for guests to dance all day whilst being covered head to toe in bright colours from Ministry of Colours.
Other sponsors include Kirkstall Brewery and Slingsby Gin, with Punjabi Heaven from Roundhay providing delicious street food for the day. Through finding Yorkshire-based sponsors, the festival aims to bring like-minded people together to make Holi Festival one of the biggest events in the Leeds calendar.
Holi Festival will take place on 11 March 2023 at Beaverworks from 12.30pm till 7.30pm.
Tier one and two tickets have already sold out for the seven hour event, but remaining tier three tickets are still available to grab.
You can win a luxury Manchester apartment worth £350k for just £4.99
Daisy Jackson
We all know that Manchester’s property scene has gone wild in the last few years – so the chance to own your own furnished luxury apartment for only £4.99 sounds almost too good to be true.
But it’s really happening, with a new competition where the top prize is a two-bedroom apartment right in the city centre.
The stunning flat overlooking Angel Meadows, valued at £350k, could be yours for only £4.99. I know. Unreal.
This InstaWin competition is going to allow one lucky winner to live mortgage-free in Manchester, with all the best bits of our brilliant city centre on the doorstep.
If the winner doesn’t want the apartment, there’s a £250k cash alternative up for grabs, transferred directly into your bank.
And 2,000 runners-up will receive prizes worth £170k in total, with top prizes of £10k tax-free cash.
So back to that pad. Tucked in the beautiful new NOMA quarter, the flat is inside the Meadowside development, a short walk from Manchester landmarks and green space.
Inside the luxury Manchester apartment you could win
You’ll be a 10-minute walk from Manchester Victoria and not much further from the Manchester Arndale, as well as cultural landmarks like Manchester Art Gallery and the Central Library.
You’ll also have brilliant local pubs like The Marble Arch and The Angel right outside, and food hotspots like Mackie Mayor and Ramona just a short walk away.
The dog-friendly apartments come with residents-only amenities including free tea and coffee in the lounge, a top-quality gym and yoga space.
It’s within The Gate building in the £235m residential development of one-, two-, and three-bedroom apartments.
All apartments feature a video door entry system, a concierge service, CCTV, lockable bike storage and more.
Elite Competitions will also give you £10,000 worth of furniture.
Communal space in the two-bedroom flat you could winThe gym at the Manchester apartment, which is off Angel Meadows
If the lucky winner chooses to rent out the flat, they can expect to bring in about £2,500 per month in rental income.
Elite Competitions will cover all fees and stamp duty on the property.
To be in with a chance to win the £350k apartment for only £4.99, you just need to purchase a ticket here.
If your number(s) match any of the InstaWin prizes, you’ll become an InstaWinner, and will be entered into the main draw for the apartment.
The more tickets you buy, the greater the chance you’ll have to win, and you can win more than one prize if multiple numbers match InstaWin prizes.
You can have a maximum of 10,000 entries into the competition to win a Manchester apartment
The draw takes place on Sunday 31 December at 3pm.
Yard & Coop – The Manchester institution taking the Christmas Markets by storm… again
Harry Quick
Firm favourite Manchester restaurant Yard and Coop is back on the Manchester Christmas Markets this year, giving us our annual fix of fried festive favourites – and they’re clucking lovely.
Their restaurant – a staple favourite in the Northern Quarter – is also whipping up some incredible festive specials.
Yard & Coop Christmas Markets
Yard and Coop at the Manchester Christmas Markets. Credit: The Manc GroupYard and Coop at the Manchester Christmas Markets. Credit: The Manc Group
The much-loved Northern Quarter establishment, famed for its buttermilk fried chicken, has pitched up once again on St Ann’s Square.
They’ve whipped up a menu of their classic chicken dishes, each with a festive twist, and you don’t have to look far to see someone walking around with a cone full of the fried stuff.
This chicken institute has made some of the best salt and pepper-loaded fries around. The sticky sweet soy sauce coats the fries along with a heavy dusting of the salt and pepper blend and crispy deep-fried seaweed. Obviously, they are loaded with pieces of buttermilk chicken breast, but that goes without saying.
Yard and Coop at the Manchester Christmas Markets. Credit: The Manc Group
It’s the most wonderful time of the year and the ‘Dirty Santa’ tray was certainly that. Fried chicken and fries covered in lashings rich chicken gravy, hot cranberry sauce and a sprinkle of parsnip crisps for a texture sensation. Even after eight billion mince pies I reckon Father Christmas would have room for these.
A returning favourite has rightfully made its way back onto the menu too. Chicken and fries piled high inside a waffle cone drizzled with BBQ and ranch sauce. It’s a bit of a messy one but that’s the whole point – you eat the cone at the end, so you clean up your own mess!
Yard & Coop festive restaurant specials
All systems are still a-go back in their Northern Quarter base in time for Christmas. Everything is better inside a Yorkshire pudding, right? Well, this festive craze has been beautifully adapted to incorporate Yard and Coop’s signature buttermilk chicken.
It’s Christmas dinner with all the trimmings wrapped in a soft Yorkshire burrito. Oh, and there’s a massive pot of chicken gravy to dip if you weren’t hungry enough reading this.
If you want to go the whole nine yards, the ‘Winner Winner Christmas Dinner’ is back and better than ever. Fully loaded with fried chicken breast, crispy fried potatoes, cheesy mash topped with homemade stuffing balls, creamed sprouts, cranberry hot sauce and buttered kale.
Sprouts are famously a bit hit and miss, aren’t they? Well, not these. Even the most devout brussels sprout hater would be converted by Yard and Coop’s homemade sprout bhajis. This little taste of India accompanies the real showstopper of the selection.
Yard and Coop’s ‘Boxing Day Burger’ transports you to that post-Christmas takeaway slapped between a seeded brioche bun. The signature fried chicken is smothered in their Ruby Murray sauce and stacked alongside cucumber raita salad, a couple of mini poppadoms and those delightful bhajis. Good luck getting it all in one bite, it’s a biggun.
You can find Yard and Coop on Edge Street and at St Ann’s Square at the Manchester Christmas Markets until 21 December.
Clementine Hall -
3rd March 2023 
